How can PHP developers ensure that textblocks are displayed correctly after user input in a form?

When displaying user input in a form, PHP developers can ensure that textblocks are displayed correctly by using the htmlspecialchars() function to escape special characters and prevent XSS attacks. This function converts special characters like <, >, ", ', and & into their HTML entities, ensuring that the text is displayed as-is without any unintended HTML rendering.

&lt;?php
// Get user input from a form
$userInput = $_POST[&#039;user_input&#039;];

// Display the user input using htmlspecialchars() to prevent XSS attacks
echo htmlspecialchars($userInput);
?&gt;