Table 4 Comic book acceptability based on the survey comments (N = 134^a)

 Positive

92

82.9

• I liked everything; it was very good reading.

 Neutral

8

7.2

• I liked how the [comic book] explained it, but … didn’t like that the characters seem clueless.

 Negative

11

9.9

• Horrible comic; I could’ve done better.

 Images

17

29.8

• Illustration was beautiful, and I learned a lot.

 Length

18

31.6

• Yes, because it’s fun to read, and it’s a short story … and it explains a lot.

• I didn’t like … that they talked too much, and [it was] a lot of reading.

 Comprehension

22

38.6

• It’s easy to understand what is happening in this book, and HPV is different than HIV.

 Ethnic Representation

24

47.1

• I liked the characters because you never see dark-skinned Muslims in comics.

• I like … the Somali characters.

 Diverse characters

7

13.7

• That Iman is thinking about HPV and talking to her mother and grandmother about [it].

 Realistic/relatable

20

39.2

• It shows people who are similar to them and can relate to it.

• I didn’t think it was realistic … the mom is easily convinced as well as the students.

 Education/information

92

95.8

• I thought it was nice, it taught me a lot about HPV [that] I didn’t know.

 Information sharing

31

32.3

• I like [that] the friends talk to each other about their vaccination.

 Humor

34

35.4

• I liked how it was funny.

 HPV

33

33.7

• HPV can lead to cancer.

 HPV vaccine

82

83.7

• Get yourself vaccinated before it’s too late.

 Perceived barriers

11

11.2

• To not be scared of needles.

• I liked how the book highlighted that the HPV vaccine doesn’t have pork gelatin because I know I [would] get it [without] this barrier.

 Social support

43

43.9

• It taught me to talk to my parents about HPV and how I could prevent from getting it.