COVID-19, which originated from the Chinese city of Wuhan in December 2019, was declared by the World Health Organisation (WHO) as a pandemic on 11 March 2020 (WHO, 2020). The pandemic has disrupted the social, economic and cultural makeup of a globalised world. As a result, countries have taken drastic measures to contain the spread of the virus. These include the closure of international borders, restricting the movement of people, and the lockdown of public spaces such as schools, places of worship and shopping centres.

Consequently, there has been an escalation in the use of social media platforms by people to connect (Fuchs, 2020) and maintain personal contacts during the COVID-19 pandemic. This has led to a surge in COVID-19 related health communication studies on social media platforms, including Twitter, Facebook, WeChat, Instagram, YouTube, Reddit and Gab (Budhwani & Sun, 2020; (Chan et al., 2020; Chen & Ferrara, 2020; Cinelli et al., 2020; Llewellyn, 2020).

Another social media platform that is increasing in popularity among people is WhatsApp, particularly its status updates feature. The WhatsApp status updates tool is a feature that allows users to self-generate and share text, photos, videos and GIF information that disappear after 24 hours, between contacts saved in the phone address books of both the sender and the recipient (WhatsApp Inc., 2020).

Although WhatsApp is considered a useful tool for COVID-19 information dissemination, only a few studies used it. Among those that used WhatsApp, the majority focused on the app’s messenger feature (Gebbia et al., 2020; de Maio Nascimento, 2020; Rosenberg & Asterhan, 2018). Thus, less attention has been accorded to how an ephemeral tool like WhatsApp status updates could be used to disseminate COVID-19 relevant information in a developing country like Ghana. An important feature of self-destruction messages is the immediacy and ability to draw users’ attention (Chen & Cheung, 2019). Pielot et al. (2014) assert that “user attentiveness is the degree to which (s)he is paying attention to incoming instant messages” (p. 3320).

A March 2020 blog post published by WhatsApp stated that the app has more than two billion users globally. Ghana enjoys a vibrant social media environment with approximately six million active users as of January 2020, with WhatsApp as the most popular (Sasu, 2020). For instance, in its 2020 report, the National Communication Authority (NCA) reported that WhatsApp was the most preferred application for making calls via the internet, 96.8% as compared to Facebook (Messenger) with 24.8% and Facetime (6.5%) in Ghana (NCA, 2020a). In addition, the Ministry of Communication in Ghana (2019) reports that Ghana is ranked as the top country in Africa and 9th globally for the number of hours spent per day on social media. The widespread use of social media, particularly WhatsApp, makes it a helpful platform for sharing vital information during a health emergency such as COVID-19 in Ghana.

This paper draws upon the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) to examine how young adult undergraduate students use an ephemeral messaging feature, the WhatsApp status updates tool, for COVID-19 relevant information sharing instead of regular messages. The key questions addressed are: (1) Can the WhatsApp status updates tool be used to share COVID-19 messages to influence adherence to COVID-19 preventive protocols?; (2) What factors influenced young adult Ghanaian communication undergraduate students’ choice of WhatsApp status updates for sharing COVID-19 information among their social contacts?; (3) How useful is the WhatsApp status updates tool in disseminating COVID-19 information and combating fake news?; (4) What is the goal for choosing to communicate information about COVID-19 via WhatsApp status updates tool (instead of regular messaging), so that the message disappears after a while instead of being permanent?

A central contention of this paper is that the focus on transmission approaches ignore the socio-cultural foundations and people’s everyday media habits that may influence how the audience responds to life-saving information obstructs adherence to prevention messages during the COVID-19 pandemic. This paper further argues that in the face of over-abundance of information during health emergencies, public health interventions targeting young adults in places of high social media penetration should focus on novel technologies like ephemeral social media messaging tools to achieve positive health outcomes. However, there are limited qualitative studies on the factors influencing users’ intention to adopt self-destructing social media platforms, including the WhatsApp status updates tool for sharing COVID-19 prevention information in a developing country context. The findings of such research could provide a nuanced understanding of the factors that influence the choice of the WhatsApp status updates tool to stimulate COVID-19 discussion among young adults and their social contacts and their decision to adhere or otherwise to prevent messages. There is a need for qualitative exploration of how the intimacy, immediacy, and relatively high response rate of a closed ephemeral social media platform like the WhatsApp status updates tool may influence how audience respond to messages promoting prevention adherence during public health emergencies.

The Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) offers the theoretical underpinning for this study. The TAM explains the determinants of acceptance or rejection of new technologies by users (Bagozzi, 2007; Marangunić & Granić, 2015). This theory, proposed by Davis et al. (1989) postulates that users’ intentions explained in terms of their attitude towards novel technologies is the primary determinant of their acceptance or rejection of such innovation. The TAM theory is based on two main constructs (1) Perceived usefulness (PU) and Perceived ease-of-use (PEOU), with the latter having a direct impact on the former. Numerous empirical studies have corroborated the TAM theory in explaining users’ attitude towards accepting or rejecting technology (Coa & Setiawan, 2017; Teo et al., 2016; Udenze, 2020; Wong, 2015; Zhou &Teo, 2017). This study proposes that users purposively choose the WhatsApp status updates tool out of many other social media platforms to satisfy their COVID-19 related information needs.

According to Coa and Setiawan (2017), two external variables, perceived enjoyment and social presence, support TAM. Perceived enjoyment is a subjective psychological attribute of things enjoyable (Chin & Ahmad, 2015). High enjoyment can lead to technology adoption (Coa and Setiawan, 2017; Dickinger et al., 2008). In accordance with TAM, Coa and Setiawan (2017) found that perceived enjoyment of ephemeral social media content was a significant factor in influencing user attitudes and consequently intention to adopt such technology. Hassanein and Head (2007) explained that social presence allows a user to feel that everyone else is psychologically present in a medium.

According to Davis et al. (1989) perceived usefulness is the extent to which a user of a particular technology believes that such use will enhance their everyday endeavours and thus is a predictor of people’s intention to adopt an innovation. In an acute health situation such as COVID-19, where whole societies lockdown and social and physical distancing has been the norm, the need to connect via an social media platform with one’s friends and family has taken on added importance. The utility of the WhatsApp status updates space to help stimulate conversations among one’s contacts comes in handy in such emergency conditions.

Davis et al. (1989) further explain that perceived ease of use is the extent to which a technology user believes that such usage will be devoid of effort. The authors further stated that perceived ease of use is a prerequisite for technology adoption and appropriation.

Per the TAM theory, WhatsApp status updates tool has perceived ease of use. Moreover, features of the tool, such as intimacy and privacy, make it popular among users. Thus, users believe that the app’s use enhances their daily activities. In relation to TAM, Udenze (2020) notes that users acknowledge that WhatsApp was useful in improving their everyday activities, and thus they had a positive disposition towards it.

This study is positioned within the TAM theory by exploring the user experience of the WhatsApp status updates tool of young adult undergraduate communication students and their reasons for utilising an ephemeral messaging tool instead of regular message formats for health communication during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Eight main themes emerged from the data: (1) Usefulness for message dissemination; (2) fear of COVID-19; (3) sharing information; (4) combating fake news; and (5) improving adherence to COVID-19 prevention protocols. The study participants recognised the utility of a novel tool like WhatsApp status updates space as sources of reliable information during acute health situations, which signifies perceived usefulness. Also, the perceived ease of use of this tool was apparent as a recurring narrative was the (6) motivation to use ephemeral message formats for COVID-19 information sharing, signifying the lack of effort required to do so. However, participants narrated some (7) challenges associated with WhatsApp status update usage. Lastly, a theme that emerged was (8) the coping strategies adopted by the participants to navigate such challenges.

The findings of this study have implications for theory and practice. This study assessed how young adult communication undergraduate students use the WhatsApp status updates tool to share COVID-19 relevant information, their motivation for this behaviour, and its influence on their adherence to the prevention messages. This study provides insights into how perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use of an ephemeral social media tool influenced users’ intention to adopt novel technologies for information sharing (Bagozzi, 2007; Marangunić and Granić, 2015) during acute health situations.

The link between social responsibility, altruism, and the need to support each other during a pandemic encouraged participants to re-echo public health campaign messages and related information among their social contacts via their WhatsApp status updates space. The study established that the participants’ preference for an ephemeral messaging format via the WhatsApp status updates feature instead of regular message formats addressed their need to share COVID-19 messages among their close social contacts in a timely and quick manner (Fuchs, 2020; Rosenberg & Asterhan, 2018). The ultimate goal was to improve people’s adherence to the prevention protocols of the disease. As stated by van Bavel et al. (2020), the essence is that during a pandemic, effective science communication is essential for reaching people with prevention messages and instigating positive health behaviour. However, the majority of national COVID-19 public health campaigns still employ top-down transmission approaches mostly through mass media channels like radio and television, as well as direct social media messaging platforms (Gebbia et al., 2020; de Maio Nascimento, 2020; Rosenberg & Asterhan, 2018), in search of improving prevention adherence. Despite the ubiquitousness of mass communication channels for information sharing, social media applications with ephemeral features that provide intimacy and immediacy have had significant influence in promoting positive behaviour among users during the COVID-19 pandemic, as revealed by the participants. Hence the study participants were influenced by factors such as ability to provoke an interaction with receivers and a higher chance of messages been viewed by people out of curiosity, compared to regular message formats, to employ their WhatsApp status updates space for COVID-19 health communication purposes. Other factors such as an opportunity to provide access to a single or same message to all of one’s WhatsApp contacts in a non-intrusive and non-spam manner; availability of cues to know all viewers of a particular message, and a relatively quick way to update previously sent messages influenced participants choice of ephemeral message formats to promote positive health behaviour during the COVID-19 pandemic. These findings align with previous works (e.g., Apriliyant, 2020; Chen and Cheung, 2019; Morlok et al., 2018; Sutikno et al., 2016), providing evidence of the preference for self-destructing messaging formats over regular ones. The researcher speculates that the pattern of use of WhatsApp status updates feature was due to its popularity and perceived usefulness among users relative to other social media platforms like telegram and Viber (Sutikno et al., 2016). Drawing from the findings, one can argue that the speed and timeliness provided by ephemeral social media platforms like the WhatsApp status updates tool could be deployed for sharing reliable information to compliment government mass communication sources during health emergencies. Findings of a related study from Macau affirm that the novelty to update information is a driver for technology adoption among university students (Zhou & Teo, 2017). This empowered participants’ choice to adopt a novel technology, the WhatsApp status updates tool, consistently during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The over-abundance of information during acute health situations have been reported to negatively affect audience’s ability to decipher and adopt prevention messages (van Bavel et al., 2020; Cinelli et al., 2020). Too much information coupled with the threat of misinformation and disinformation further makes the situation dire. This is because the threat of disinformation and misinformation puts a strain on people’s ability to effectively distinguish between useful and outrageous information (van Bavel et al., 2020; Cinelli et al., 2020). As a result, people tend to rely on interpersonal contacts, both physically and online, for trusted information. This study’s findings affirm that to counter the threat of fake news, COVID-19 information shared by participants was from reliable sources such as the websites of the Ministry of Health, Ghana and the WHO, and major television and radio stations in Ghana. The implication here is that for health communication to be effective, the audience’s needs should be factored in the planning, design, implementation, and evaluation of campaigns. The current study’s participants expressed the urgency to incorporate desirable message formats to direct the attention of the audience to trusted social media information sources.

Consequently, banal traditional text-based messages will not suffice in promoting prevention adherence during a pandemic. This study found that perceived enjoyment of ephemeral message formats by both senders and receivers influenced their decision to use the WhatsApp status update tool to satisfy their COVID-19 related informational needs. According to this study’s findings, in line with the TAM theory, perceived enjoyment of messages was important for attracting users and influencing a positive attitude towards patronising the WhatsApp status updates space of their contacts. It appears that the ephemerality and multimedia nature of such messages influenced the perceived enjoyment of users of the app. In this way, this study’s findings align with the assertion of other researchers that high enjoyment of ephemeral social media content was a significant factor in influencing user attitudes and, consequently, intention to adopt such technology (Coa and Setiawan, 2017; Dickinger et al., 2008). In promoting adherence to prevention protocols, public health campaign messages could promote positive behaviour by incorporating entertainment-value components to achieve optimum levels of perceived enjoyment. This could influence user attitudes and consequently intention to adopt technology to meet their information needs during health emergencies.

Other findings affirmed that emergency public health campaign messages should be relevant to the target audience and must also employ Information Communication Technology (ICT) platforms that meet the everyday media habits of recipients. This position is consistent with the TAM theory’s construct of perceived usefulness of technology (Davis et al., 1989). By showing that people consider COVID-19 relevant information that circulates on the WhatsApp status updates space of their social contacts as helpful in keeping them updated, this study has established the need for future pandemic communication campaigns to move beyond mass information dissemination approaches. Therefore, public health campaigns should incorporate appropriate formative research and audience analysis components to segment the audience to cater to their diverse informational needs. The current study also revealed that closed social networks are essential sources of trusted information during acute health situations. Also, the present research found that sharing COVID-19 messages via the WhatsApp status updates feature among users can influence their adherence to prevention protocols. Thus, this tool could be used to educate and improve compliance to COVID-19 prevention messages among young adult undergraduate students in developing countries. The positive emotions and the sense of self-efficacy users acquire from employing their WhatsApp status updates space for social good could have instigated this. In this way, the study’s findings align with the TAM theory’s assertion that perceived usefulness associated with using novel technologies depends on users’ belief that such use will enhance their everyday endeavours, which is a predictor of people’s intention to adopt this innovation during the pandemic.

However, public health communication campaigns could be fraught with challenges. Participants in this study echoed this assertion as they voiced some unintended consequences that threatened to derail the utility of employing the WhatsApp status updates tool to share COVID-19 relevant information. Some of the challenges included discouragement from personal contacts, doubt over the authenticity of information posted, and people’s reluctance to accept that COVID-19 is real, as revealed by the study findings. The implication of this is that, although users may expose themselves to prevention messages via other people’s WhatsApp status updates space, they may not necessarily have a positive disposition to adhere to them. This position is consistent with Pielot et al.’s (2014) assertion that the fact that a receiver has seen a message is not a good predictor of whether the person will promptly attend to the message. As such, reinforcement of COVID-19 public health campaign messages by trusted voices among their social networks could improve message reception and adherence to prevention protocols. Also, Shambare (2014) observed that the high cost of technology and connectivity challenges in many developing countries inhibits social media’s effective use. The current study revealed similarities with Shambare’s (2014) observation. To illustrate, high internet charges were identified as a challenge in using the WhatsApp status updates feature for information sharing according to the present study’s findings. Since internet connectivity is a prerequisite for connecting to one’s social contacts via social media platforms during a pandemic (Fuchs, 2020), governments should improve the ICT regulatory environment and provide adequate infrastructure to improve access, affordability, reliability, and internet speed. The view advanced in this study is that the effectiveness of emergency public health campaigns could be enhanced by employing multiple platforms (mass media, interpersonal, digital, and alternative media) that meet the different level of technological savviness of the varied audience segments. As such future emergency public health communication should endeavour to adopt an integrated approach.

Although identifying the needs and gratifications for the WhatsApp status updates tool usage among young adult undergraduate students is an important initial step in social media-based health communication, the potential influence of other mass media, social media and interpersonal sources that compete for users’ attention were beyond the scope of this study. Therefore, the influence of all the media choices available to young adult undergraduate students in their quest to satisfy their health communication needs remains unanswered.

Finally, the current study has theoretical implications. This study has generated further insights into students’ motivation that explain the use of social media in their everyday life and thus contribute to the extant literature through enhancing our understanding of the applicability of the TAM theory in explaining young adult’s intention to use an ephemeral messaging feature for health communication purposes. The researcher agrees with Zhou and Teo (2017) that qualitative approaches that provide a nuanced and deeper understanding of users’ experience of technology can improve the theory-building process compared to adopting quantitative methods. Thus, the construction of the TAM theory would advance greatly in this way.

Although the findings have implications for health communication, the relatively small number of participants raises issues about the generalizability of the findings beyond the study setting. Also, since the researcher who collected the data is a faculty member at the AUCC, where the participants are students, there is the possibility of social desirability bias. That is, respondents tell the researcher what they think he would like to hear and not what pertains to their everyday activities. Although the researcher is not involved in teaching, mentoring, or grading them, this may affect the study findings. In addressing the issue of desirability bias, all participants were assured that there were no right or wrong answers and that their responses would not bring them any personal benefits beyond participating in the study. There is, therefore, the need to investigate the applicability of the findings in different contexts.

The findings show that young adult communication undergraduate students of the AUCC, Accra, Ghana use of WhatsApp status updates tool was purposive.

This study concludes that ephemeral messaging via the WhatsApp status updates feature is a stronger predictor of attentiveness, implying a higher chance that receivers will notice and read the message. The perceived enjoyment of transient message formats is responsible for this. As a result, the WhatsApp status updates tool effectively communicates health information in an era where social media users can be overwhelmed with information.

Additionally, this study establishes that adherence to COVID-19 prevention protocols improved among participants. Thus, the efforts of public health campaigners such as governments could be complemented by social media influencers and peer-to-peer educators. These people could be tasked to use various ephemeral social media tools such as WhatsApp to share life-saving information during acute health situations among their close contacts. This approach could stimulate further discussion, instigate social media users’ appetite to seek additional information from reliable sources, and ultimately improve positive health outcomes.

As the use of this WhatsApp tool for health communication among young adults grows, it is suggested that to improve its worth, information shared should be culturally sensitive to the particular needs of young adult undergraduate students from developing countries. Also, Ghana’s national COVID-19 public health communication campaigns need to integrate aspects of interpersonal communication using social media platforms for closed networks such as WhatsApp. Finally, future research must focus on the potential influence of the WhatsApp status updates tool and other ephemeral social media platforms like Snapchat, Facebook and Instagram on adherence to Covid-19 prevention messages in different user categories.