Science Communication 2008 Abstracts
Science Communication Interest Group
Environmental legitimacy: Developing reliable and valid measures of perceived organizational environmental performance • Denise Bortree, Penn State University • Communication about environmental policies and practices has become a critical area of focus for corporations. Organizations that are perceived as more environmentally responsible experience fewer negative consequences from key stakeholders and tend to be favored by consumers. This research developed and tested measures of environmental legitimacy. It also measured the relationship between environmental legitimacy and two other variables, ethical environmental communication and knowledge of organizational environmental performance. Both relationships were significant in a positive direction.
Digital Veils, Virtual Triage, and Health Taboos: Health Information Seeking and Anonymity on the Web • Chris Brabham, University of Utah • This qualitative research links together converging literature about health information-seeking on the Web, the notion of anonymity on the Web, and health taboos. Data from open-ended responses to an online health survey (N = 366) are collected. Analyses of the responses to questions about private health conditions reveal an unchanging array of health taboos and embarrassing health conditions.
Why Can’t They Get it Right? Mobilizing Journalism, Government Accountability, and the Autism-Vaccine Controversy • Chris Clarke, Cornell University • The mass media are often criticized for inadequately presenting health risk information to the public. This paper argues, however, that decisions to include risk information represent a fundamental tension between norms of objectivity and government accountability on one end and “mobilizing” journalism on the other. The paper explores this tension in the context of the autism-vaccine controversy. Implications for journalism ethics and risk communication are discussed.
Conflict Theory and Climate Change News: The Interplay of Media, Science, Politics, Industry and Audience • Julia Corbett, Lindsay E. Young, and Byron L. Davis, University of Utah • This study investigated factors contributing to the mercurial path of U.S. news coverage of climate change since 1985. Time-series analysis uncovered both “leaders” and “followers”: media attention to climate change was led by Congressional attention, and after several years, by increasing temperatures. There were feedback loops between public concern and a variety of factors, including news coverage. Scientific evidence had the most complex role, leading and following numerous variables both positively and negatively.
Socialization or rewards: Prediciting American scientist-media interactions • Sharon Dunwoody, Dominique Brossard, and Anthony Dudo, University of Wisconsin-Madison • This study investigates scientists as public communicators, particularly what factors encourage or discourage scientists from engaging in public communication via interactions with the media. Based on a US survey of biomedical scientists, the findings suggest that scientists continue to have more contact with the media than has commonly been assumed, and that status, socialization (measured via formal communication training and communication self-efficacy) and positive intrinsic rewards are all positively associated with higher frequencies of media contact.
Social Proximity and Risk: A Comparative Analysis of Media Coverage of Avian Flu in Hong Kong and in the United States • Timothy Fung, Kang Namkoong, and Dominique Brossard, University of Wisconsin-Madison Media • The purpose of this paper is to compare media coverage of avian flu in Hong Kong and in the United States, based on an analytical framework derived from the literature on public risk perceptions. Notably, this study uses the psychometric paradigm to identify a number of dimensions that should be taken into account when analyzing news coverage of risky issues.
Scientists’ Understanding of Nanotechology, Nanoscience and the Public • Amelia Greiner, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health; Laura Black, Ohio University; Katherine McComas, Cornell University and Chris Clarke, Cornell University • This study investigates what scientists engaging in nanoscale science and engineering (NSE) research understand about the public and its perceptions of nanotechnology. It offers a qualitative analysis of 20 in-depth interviews with prominent NSE scientists that explores their perceptions of nanotechnology, public knowledge, and the appropriate role of public engagement. The conclusions suggest implications for public engagement, while offering future directions for science communication scholars advocating public engagement more generally.
Understanding how audiences understand science on stage: Cultural context in the dramatization of Darwin’s letters • Megan Halpern, Cornell University • This study explored the relationship between science, performance, and audience in a theatrical production of RE:Design, A Dramatisation of the Correspondence of Charles Darwin and Asa Gray by Craig Baxter. A focus group and supplementary survey were conducted to learn what audience members thought they had received from attending the performance.
A Crying Shame: Shaken Baby Syndrome in the News • Heidi Hennink-Kaminski, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Elizabeth Dougall, Chapel Hill • This paper reports a qualitative analysis of broadcast news and newspaper coverage of Shaken Baby Syndrome from 1992 to 2007. The findings indicate that episodic coverage of SBS from a criminal justice perspective was the most dominant story type; thematic coverage in the form of health features emerged but with much less frequency. The dominant frames were SBS in question, scared straight, and cautionary tales. Sources were more often law enforcement, medical, and legal.
Tacit Understandings of Health Literacy: Interview and Survey Research With Health Journalists • Amanda Hinnant, Missouri School of Journalism and Maria Len-Rios, University of Missouri • This research offers both qualitative and quantitative data about how health journalists approach health literacy practically and conceptually. Using interviews with 20 writers and editors for magazines and newspapers and a survey (N=396), this analysis uncovers journalistic techniques and tacit theories for making information understandable. Findings show that journalists struggle to maintain scientific credibility while accommodating different audience literacy levels. Journalists’ definitions of health literacy strategically carve out a place for their work as translators.
Influences of Mass Media, Interpersonal Communication, and Cognitive Processing on Risks versus Benefits Perception of Nanotechnology • Shirley Ho, University of Wisconsin-Madison and Dietram Scheufele, University of Wisconsin-Madison and Elizabeth Corley, Arizona State University • This study examines the influences of mass media, interpersonal communication, and cognitive processing on perception of risks versus benefits in the context of nanotechnology, using a nationally representative telephone survey conducted in 2007. Results indicate that cognitive processes in the form of reflective integration had a significant negative main effect on risks-versus-benefits perception.
Nationwide Newspaper Coverage of Adult Obesity: A Community Structure Approach • Kristen Kiernicki, The College of New Jersey and John Pollock, College of New Jersey • A national cross-section of 28 newspapers was selected from Newsbank. Articles were scored for placement, length, headline size, presence of photographs or graphics, and “direction” (advocating for community responsibility, individual responsibility or a combination). Pearson correlations and regressions explored links between city demographics and coverage and revealed five clusters of characteristics that had significant relationships to newspaper coverage of adult obesity including race, lifestyle and SES.
Assessment of a university-based program of citizen engagement on emerging technologies • Victoria L. Kramer, University of South Carolina and John Besley, University of South Carolina • This study assesses the impact of a novel citizen engagement model. “Citizens’ Schools” on nanotechnology and fuel cell and hydrogen technology enhanced participants’ senses of science efficacy, the interpersonal fairness of scientists, and to a limited extent the procedural and informational fairness of scientists. Participation was also associated with changes in views about the risks and benefits of technology. This study advances theory in the use of justice as fairness in evaluating deliberative citizen engagement.”
Quantification of Medical News Coverage in US Newspapers • William YY Lai, University of Hong Kong • This study investigates front-page newspaper coverage of two prominent medical stories reported in the United States, with a hard news story chosen as a control. For each story, over 300 newspaper front pages were surveyed to quantify the extent of coverage (interrater agreement for all stories: >96 percent observed agreement, kappa>0.84), and identify different news sources (all stories: >90 percent observed agreement, kappa>0.80).
Source selection: A case study on agenda setting in newspaper reports following an FDA announcement on meat cloning • Jane W. Peterson, Iowa State University; Michael Bugeja, Iowa State University and Jennifer Scharpe, Iowa State University • This case study analyzes patterns of coverage by newspaper reporters following a Food and Drug Administration announcement about meat cloning. Researchers identified sources used in 81 U.S. newspapers and 37 articles from world newspapers. The study suggests that unbalanced sourcing is a chief component of agenda setting and is potentially more pronounced in science communication due to reporter lack of knowledge about the subject matter. Comparisons of U.S. vs. world newspaper sourcing also are presented.
Science vs. Sentiment: A comparison of framing in newspaper headlines and the stories they introduce • Yvonne Price, University of Florida • This study compared newspaper headline and story framing of a global science issue—the redefining of our solar system from nine planets, to eight. This global science event provided a unique opportunity to analyze how the media’s framing may be influencing the communication of hard science news.
Making Sense of Emerging Nanotechnologies: How Ordinary People Form Impressions of New Technology • Susanna Priest, UNLV and Victoria L. Kramer, University of South Carolina • Nanotechnology provides opportunities to observe opinion formation for previously unfamiliar technologies. In a panel study design, 76 individuals in South Carolina, recruited via community groups, were interviewed and surveyed during summer 2007. The results confirm some ideas about how people form opinions, while challenging others. Although 64 of the 76 reported they were not (or not very) familiar with nanotechnology, they offered 164 specific images or associations, largely consistent with scientists’ usage of the term.
Matching News Frames with Audience Values: Moderating Affect Related to Issues of Climate Change • Sonny Rosenthal • This study examined the relationship between environmental value-orientations and environmental concern, moderated by value-oriented news frames. Results show that, while a frame alone does not increase value-matched concern, the strength of the relationship between a value-concern pair was greatest after exposure to a value-matched frame. This has implications for how journalists report on environmental issues, particularly climate change.
Gender Stereotypes of Scientist Characters in Television Programs Popular Among Middle School-Aged Children • Jocelyn Steinke, Western Michigan University; Marilee Long, Colorado State University; Marne Johnson, Western Michigan University; and Savani Ghosh, Western Michigan University • This study examined gender stereotyping in portrayals of scientist characters in television programs popular among middle school-aged children. Male scientist characters were found to be both more prevalent than female scientist characters; and they were more likely to be shown with the masculine attributes or traits of independence, athleticism, and dominance. Female scientist characters were not more likely than male scientist characters to be shown with the traditional feminine attributes of dependency, caring, and romantic.
Preparing for Disaster: An Examination of Public Health Preparedness Information on Local TV Web sites • Andrea Tanner, Daniela Friedman, Daphney Barr, and Alexis Koskan, University of South Carolina • This study provides a nationwide examination of public health emergency information on local television Web sites, analyzing 293 news stories that focused on all aspects of a potential emergency, including preparedness, response and recovery. Mobilizing information (MI), defined as information that aids people to act, was also examined. Public health emergency information was present on nearly all (96%) of the sites examined.
Compliance Gaining to Change Parenting Behaviors in Cognitive-Behavioral Violence Prevention Groups • Maria Elena Villar, Florida International University • This study analyzed behavior change messages as recalled by Hispanic participants in cognitive behavioral violence prevention (CB-VP) Fatherhood groups in Miami, Florida. Using concepts from health behavior, compliance gaining and social influence, messages were classified by topic, type of behavior targeted and compliance gaining strategies used. The methodology used in this study provided a greater understanding of the motivations used to support behavior change in violence prevention parenting groups.”
Communicating the risks of Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder: Effects of message framing and exemplification • Nan Yu, Lee Ahern, Colleen Connolly-Ahern, and Fuyuan Shen, The Pennsylvania State University • This study seeks to extend and elaborate on research in message framing in health communication by examining potential interaction between gain-loss frames and exemplar-statistics message appeals. The experiment also looks at a class of health issue that has received little scrutiny – a prevention behavior that requires the cessation of a potentially dangerous activity.
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