College men are among those least likely to be vaccinated against the human papillomavirus (HPV). Viewing digital stories from other college men who were vaccinated against HPV as young adults may help influence them to seek the vaccine. Guided by the Theory of Planned Behavior, this research reports on the creation and pilot testing of digital stories to increase college men's intentions to vaccinate against HPV. We recruited college men vaccinated against HPV as young adults to participate in an online workshop to create a digital story about their HPV vaccine decision. To examine the persuasiveness of the digital stories, we then asked college-aged men who either had never been vaccinated against HPV or did not know their HPV vaccine status to complete a pretest, view the digital stories, respond to questions related to identification and emotional engagement with the stories, and complete a posttest. We used descriptive statistics to assess participants' identification and emotional engagement with the stories and paired-sample t-tests to evaluate changes in theoretical constructs from pre- to post-intervention. Results illustrated that exposure to the stories significantly influenced the participants' positive attitudes about the HPV vaccine (Mpretest = 3.41; Mposttest = 3.57, p < .02), subjective norms (Mpretest = 2.82; Mposttest = 3.33, p < .001), self-efficacy to vaccinate (Mpretest = 3.20; Mposttest = 3.39, p < .01), and intention to vaccinate against HPV within the next year (Mpretest = 2.64; Mposttest = 3.10, p < .001). Future research should assess the effectiveness of this intervention on HPV vaccine uptake.
Keywords: College men; Digital storytelling; Health communication; Narratives; Theory of Planned Behavior.
© 2025. The Author(s) under exclusive licence to American Association for Cancer Education.