Representations of preconditions for and determinants of health in the Dutch press (original) (raw)
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Patient Education and …, 2011
Today more than ever, health is one of the main topics covered by the mass media. Obviously, good health is a prime concern for all of us, and its attainment and maintenance involve many and varied aspects, including economic ones. Thus, the public finds itself immersed in a veritable sea of health-related news from many different sources, often without the means to discern what is really useful or important, or understand the true significance of the intended messages, or even appraise their accuracy [1-4]. Many population surveys have recognized the mass media as the main source of public health information [6,7]. The impact of this coverage on citizens' knowledge, perceptions and attitudes can be analyzed from two perspectives: its great power to disseminate information and form public opinion and the potential for distortion from useless or inaccurate information [5-9]. Such effects stem not only from potential information overload, but also from poor information quality, in terms of correctness, reliability, understandability, usefulness, balance and independence, which people are often unable to evaluate due to limited health literacy. In crises or emergencies, the mass media may create a ''communications storm'', which shifts attention to a single health problem, such as AIDS, SARS, BSE, or avian flu [10,11] Quantitative and qualitative analyses of mass media messages over the time can be a useful tool to evaluate their possible effects on public perceptions and behaviors. To this end, the Pisa University OCS (Osservatorio della Comunicazione Sanitaria = Health Communication Observatory) has collected and stored in a DBT (Data Base Text) all health-related articles published each day since 1999 in Italy's three most popular newspapers for quantitative and qualitative analyses. This paper describes the methods followed for collecting, storing and analyzing these articles and using the results to design questionnaire surveys on information sources, knowledge, attitudes and risk perception of citizens. To explain this methodology as example food safety related issues were investigated both with article analysis and questionnaire survey.
Health Promotion Through the Media: Challenges and Opportunities
Public Health Frontier, 2015
The world is changing from day to day, developing new tools of communication. The greatest tool developed in the 21 st century is the media. Media provides news of all kinds, including health information. The aim of this study is to describe the role of media, analyzed according to the case study of swine flu news in newspapers in Turkey. Method: This study seeks to examine the way in which swine flu (and the subsequent actions and discussion) was reported in the Turkish press, with particular attention to the framing devices used and the factors that might influence these framing decisions. Newspapers were chosen to represent the media as the design of the study. Influenza-related news for two consecutive years was chosen as the analytical subject; 575 related news reports were found. Results: There were 496 news reports in the first study year, and 50 in the second. Influenza news occurred primarily (300 news sources) between October-December 2009, while only 14 appeared during the same period in the second year. It was observed that the news pieces were initially located on first pages/covers and the upper part of the pages, covering larger areas. Disease and prevention related pictures were chosen at the crisis point, in particular. In the second year, the area occupied by swine flu news was smaller, occurring on inner pages and written by reporters (p<0.05). Conclusion: Health-related media content is provided when the subject is high on the public agenda, and if the issue poses a threat to the society, such as during crisis periods. In fact, protection is more important for health, so that health related topics should be provided in advance of crisis periods.
Health Promotion International, 1999
Courier Mail, under the two broad categories of public health and the medical model. Content analysis was utilized to assess 19 criteria which measured prominence, content, stakeholders, orientation of reporting and tone of items. The findings suggest that public health, including health promotion, is presented less often, less prominently and less positively than medical model issues . No comparable review of press reporting of these two models was identified in extensive international literature searches and this study is considered to break new ground. The potential influence of the print media in the education of the population on public health issues is presented. It is proposed that a greater understanding of the dynamics of health reporting and particularly the relationship between public health and the medical model may lead to more constructive and informative reporting.
Concern for public health is considered to be of crucial societal value for the national policy of every democratic government. As usually happens, the status and changes to social policy may be widely communicated by the media in every country in various ways, either in favor of or against government planning, depending on different factors. Such media saturation can result in deep concern in the area of health issues. Add the current economic crisis, especially as depicted in certain countries of Southern Europe, to such concerns, and reporting on health issues becomes an interesting challenge for the media outlets in these countries. This paper presents a comparative study concerning the press coverage of health issues in the Republic of Cyprus. The study is divided in two parts; the first part was conducted before and the second part after the banking crisis became evident in the local society. The aim of this paper is to examine whether health reporting in the national press was altered after the crisis, and, if so, in which ways.
A Review of the Relationship between Newspapers and Health
Global Media Journal, 2022
Abstract Lassa fever remains one of the deadliest diseases that the sub-Saharan Africa countries, especially Nigeria, have been battling with. This calls for the need to investigate if the newspaper has any role to play in this health issue; therefore, the Vanguard, Punch, The Guardian and This Day newspapers were selected for analysis. This study, which was anchored on the framing theory of the media, explored survey method of research. It covered the twelve-month period of May 2015 to June 2016. Three hundred and seventy-four (374) respondents were drawn from the three senatorial districts (Edo South, Edo North and Edo Central) in Edo State. Findings showed that the respondents were enthusiastic about the coverage given to Lassa fever outbreak by the newspapers, and that newspapers` reports have helped in increasing knowledge about Lassa fever. Based on these, the research concluded that the selected newspapers did pay attention to Lassa fever discourse, and took Lassa fever as an important issue. Among the recommendations made were that the media, particularly newspapers, should continually facilitate and sustain the discourse on Lassa fever, especially among policy makers, for them to make policies that would aid the people towards achieving good health. Also, newspapers should intensify their research on Lassa fever so that they can come up with more in-depth and detailed reports that will educate the public on the dangers of the disease, and on preventive measures they can adopt. Finally, the government and health institutions should provide an enabling environment for media to perform by providing them with required information about Lassa fever. Keywords: Awareness, Education, Health, Lassa fever, Reportage.
A Death in the Family" - A Case Study of Newspaper Influence on Health Policy Development
Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, 1994
Milio argue, however, that health campaigns aimed at producing changes only in individual behaviors are likely to have the weakest overall effect on health. They suggest that rather than using media campaigns to encourage individuals to adopt healthier behaviors, health advocates should focus their attention on gaining public policy changes that will provide better health options and more support for healthy behaviors.T he same reasoning can be applied to the comparison of the importance of the effects of health news on individual behaviors versus effects on health f>olicy. Media coverage of a health problem can affect individuals only when those individuals are exposed to the health story and have the intellectual, psychological, and finandal ability to adopt healthier behaviors. But public policy changes spurred or encouraged by media coverage of a health issue can make better health options available to individuals who never were exposed to news about that issue and to those who could not have chosen healthier behaviors even if they had wished to.
Newspaper influence on health policy development
Newspaper Research Journal, 1994
Abstract: Examines how the news media may influence health policy development through case studies of four newspaper series on health issues and the impact each had on related health policies. Shows that, in three of the four situations, newspaper coverage did not ...
How do newspapers deal with health in Sweden? A descriptive study
Patient Education and Counseling, 2007
This article was originally published in a journal published by Elsevier, and the attached copy is provided by Elsevier for the author's benefit and for the benefit of the author's institution, for non-commercial research and educational use including without limitation use in instruction at your institution, sending it to specific colleagues that you know, and providing a copy to your institution's administrator.
Importance of Mass Media in Communicating Health Messages: An Analysis
The demand for information about health has grown exponentially in the last few years. The media is an important ally in any public health situation. The local and international media play a vital role as the link between health workers and the larger public. Health authorities educate and entrust the media with essential health information, which is then relayed to the public in readily accessible formats through a variety of media channels. The mass media helps health workers expand their audience reach, which is crucial considering the fact that face-to-face channels of communication often require too many human resources and reach only a small number of people in large, underserved rural areas. The mass media provides an important link between the rural residents and vital health information. The mass media, in the form of the radio and television, are an effective way to persuade target audiences to adopt new behaviors, or to remind them of critical information.