scholarly journals Irish Media Coverage of COVID-19 Evidence-Based Research Reports From one National Agency

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Melissa K. Sharp ◽  
Zoë Forde ◽  
Cordelia McGeown ◽  
Eamon O’Murchu ◽  
Susan M. Smith ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
Risk Perceptions ◽  
Research Report ◽  
Selective Reporting ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
National Agency ◽  
Manifest Content ◽  
The Press ◽  
Research Findings

Background: How research findings are presented through domestic news can influence behaviour and risk perceptions, particularly during emergencies such as the COVID-19 pandemic. Monitoring media communications to track misinformation and find information gaps is an important component of emergency risk communication. Therefore, this study investigated the traditional media coverage of nine selected COVID-19 evidence-based research reports and associated press releases published during the initial phases of the pandemic (April to July 2020) by one national agency. Methods: NVivo was used for summative content analysis. ‘Key messages’ from each research report were proposed and 488 broadcast, print, and online media sources were coded at the phrase level. Manifest content was coded and counted to locate patterns in the data (what and how many) while latent content was analysed to further investigate these patterns (why and how). This included the coding of the presence of political and public health actors in coverage. Results: Coverage largely did not misrepresent the results of the reports, however, selective reporting and the variability in the use of quotes from governmental and public health stakeholders changed and contextualised results in different manners than perhaps originally intended in the press release. Reports received varying levels of media attention. Coverage focused on more ‘human-interest’ stories (e.g., spread of COVID-19 by children and excess mortality) as opposed to more technical reports (e.g., focusing on viral load, antibodies, testing, etc.). Conclusion: Our findings provide a case-study of European media coverage of evidence reports produced by a national agency. Results highlighted several strengths and weaknesses of current communication efforts.

scholarly journals Normalisation and Stigmatisation of Obesity in UK Newspapers: a Visual Content Analysis

2013 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 82-91 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mr. Chris Patterson ◽  
Dr. Shona Hilton
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Content Analysis ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
The Body ◽  
Health Concern ◽  
Global Public Health ◽  
Obese Adults ◽  
Manifest Content ◽  
Body Sizes ◽  
The Uk

Obesity represents a major and growing global public health concern. The mass media play an important role in shaping public understandings of health, and obesity attracts much media coverage. This study offers the first content analysis of photographs illustrating UK newspaper articles about obesity. The researchers studied 119 articles and images from five major national newspapers. Researchers coded the manifest content of each image and article and used a graphical scale to estimate the body size of each image subject. Data were analysed with regard to the concepts of the normalisation and stigmatisation of obesity. Articles’ descriptions of subjects’ body sizes were often found to differ from coders’ estimates, and subjects described as obese tended to represent the higher values of the obese BMI range, differing from the distribution of BMI values of obese adults in the UK. Researchers identified a tendency for image subjects described as overweight or obese to be depicted in stereotypical ways that could reinforce stigma. These findings are interpreted as illustrations of how newspaper portrayals of obesity may contribute to societal normalisation and the stigmatisation of obesity, two forces that threaten to harm obese individuals and undermine public health efforts to reverse trends in obesity.

scholarly journals Does preregistration improve the credibility of research findings?

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Rubin
Keyword(s):  
Data Collection ◽  
Multiple Testing ◽  
Research Data ◽  
Public Access ◽  
Research Report ◽  
Selective Reporting ◽  
Optional Stopping ◽  
Research Findings ◽  
Analytical Approaches ◽  
Published Research

Preregistration entails researchers registering their planned research hypotheses, methods, and analyses in a time-stamped document before they undertake their data collection and analyses. This document is then made available with the published research report to allow readers to identify discrepancies between what the researchers originally planned to do and what they actually ended up doing. This historical transparency is supposed to facilitate judgments about the credibility of the research findings. The present article provides a critical review of 17 of the reasons behind this argument. The article covers issues such as HARKing, multiple testing, p-hacking, forking paths, optional stopping, researchers’ biases, selective reporting, test severity, publication bias, and replication rates. It is concluded that preregistration’s historical transparency does not facilitate judgments about the credibility of research findings when researchers provide contemporary transparency in the form of (a) clear rationales for current hypotheses and analytical approaches, (b) public access to research data, materials, and code, and (c) demonstrations of the robustness of research conclusions to alternative interpretations and analytical approaches.

scholarly journals Does preregistration improve the credibility of research findings?

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Rubin
Keyword(s):  
Data Collection ◽  
Multiple Testing ◽  
Research Data ◽  
Public Access ◽  
Research Report ◽  
Selective Reporting ◽  
Optional Stopping ◽  
Research Findings ◽  
Analytical Approaches ◽  
Published Research

Preregistration entails researchers registering their planned research hypotheses, methods, and analyses in a time-stamped document before they undertake their data collection and analyses. This document is then made available with the published research report to allow readers to identify discrepancies between what the researchers originally planned to do and what they actually ended up doing. This historical transparency is supposed to facilitate judgments about the credibility of the research findings. The present article provides a critical review of 17 of the reasons behind this argument. The article covers issues such as HARKing, multiple testing, p-hacking, forking paths, optional stopping, researchers’ biases, selective reporting, test severity, publication bias, and replication rates. It is concluded that preregistration’s historical transparency does not facilitate judgments about the credibility of research findings when researchers provide contemporary transparency in the form of (a) clear rationales for current hypotheses and analytical approaches, (b) public access to research data, materials, and code, and (c) demonstrations of the robustness of research conclusions to alternative interpretations and analytical approaches.

Risk and Precaution

2021 ◽  
pp. 85-102
Author(s):  
Stephen D. John
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Big Data ◽  
Health Policy ◽  
Public Health Policy ◽  
Big Data Analytics ◽  
Collective Good ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
Emerging Issues ◽  
Research Findings ◽  
Based Medicine

This chapter develops schematic remarks on different aspects of the ethics of risk. First, it outlines some problems in the ethics of chance, paying particular attention to the prevention paradox. It turns to the ethics of certainty, sketching ongoing debates over the precautionary principle in public health policy and how they relate to the evidence-based medicine movement. It also explains emerging issues around concepts of risk and precaution in epidemiology that are linked to the rise of Big Data analytics. The chapter addresses problems concerning the uses of research findings by policymakers rather than their generation by epidemiologists. It points out how problems of chance and certainty complicate the task of balancing between individual interests and the collective good.

Translating evidence to policy

2020 ◽  
pp. 312-319
Author(s):  
Lauren Smith ◽  
Ichiro Kawachi
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Public Policy ◽  
Health Policy ◽  
Public Health Policy ◽  
Policy Making ◽  
Policy Formation ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
Research Findings

As a result of reading this chapter, you will be able to: identify the challenges that arise in translating research findings to public policy; understand the frequently cited barriers to evidence-based public health policy making from the perspective of legislators; take steps to bridge the gap between evidence and policy formation.

scholarly journals Innovations in communication: the Internet and the psychology of vaccination decisions

2011 ◽  
Vol 16 (17) ◽  
Author(s):  
C Betsch
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Health Communication ◽  
Risk Perceptions ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
Public Health Communication ◽  
Use Of The Internet ◽  
Use Of Social Media ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Based Medicine

This paper provides a psychological perspective on the possible effect of the Internet on the decision against vaccination. The reported importance of the Internet in health decisions is still low, but rising; especially the amount of interactive use of the Internet is increasing, e.g. due to the use of social media. It is argued that the fact that individuals do not report the Internet to be an important source of information does not necessarily mean that the information obtained in their Internet searches is not influential in their decisions. Evidence is summarised here regarding the (anti-)vaccination information on the Internet, and its influence on risk perceptions and on vaccination intentions and behaviour in relation to the encoded information. The conclusion suggests that scholars should strive to explain the underlying processes and potential mediators of vaccination decisions to increase the effectiveness of health communication. In reference to a definition of evidence-based medicine, a great future challenge lies in evidence-based public health communication based on interdisciplinary research involving public health, medical research, communication science and psychology.

scholarly journals Spatial disparities in mortality by causes of death in the Republic of Moldova

2021 ◽  
Vol 64 (4) ◽  
pp. 55-61
Author(s):  
Olga Penina ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Liver Cirrhosis ◽  
Causes Of Death ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
National Agency ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Republic Of Moldova ◽  
Central Regions ◽  
The Republic ◽  
Regional Mortality

Background: Previous studies have shown long-term unfavourable changes in mortality in the Republic of Moldova accompanied by recent improvements. Little is known about the regional mortality differentiation which is an important tool for evidence-based public health policy. The aim of the study is to assess the current geographical disparities of all-cause and cause-specific mortality in Moldova and to identify evidence-based modalities to reduce them. Material and methods: This cross-sectional study is based on the corrected results of the 2014 census and individual death records for the 2012-2016 period provided by the National Agency for Public Health. Global Moran’s index and local indicators of spatial autocorrelation were computed based on contiguity matrix. Results: All-cause mortality gradient between the northern and central regions was found for males (Moran’s index=0.47, p<0.001) and females (Moran’s index=0.44, p<0.001). Digestive and cardiovascular diseases for both sexes and external causes of death for males had a statistically significant influence on the inter-regional mortality differentiation. Liver cirrhosis contributed the most to the geographical difference between the North and the Centre (Moran’s index=0.59, p<0.001), especially for females. Conclusions: The results of this study point to the existence of different drinking habits of the Moldovan population between the northern and central regions. The central regions that form the cluster of “high-high” mortality from liver cirrhosis should be considered as primarily targets for antialcohol policies

scholarly journals Pedagogical Scholarship in Public Health: A Call for Cultivating Learning Communities to Support Evidence-Based Education

2017 ◽  
Vol 132 (6) ◽  
pp. 679-683 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cheryl Merzel ◽  
Perry Halkitis ◽  
Cheryl Healton
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Health Education ◽  
Educational Research ◽  
Public Health Education ◽  
Dissemination And Implementation ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
Active Engagement ◽  
The Public ◽  
Research Findings ◽  
Pedagogical Research

Public health education is experiencing record growth and transformation. The current emphasis on learning outcomes necessitates attention to creating and evaluating the best curricula and learning methods for helping public health students develop public health competencies. Schools and programs of public health would benefit from active engagement in pedagogical research and additional platforms to support dissemination and implementation of educational research findings. We reviewed current avenues for sharing public health educational research, curricula, and best teaching practices; we identified useful models from other health professions; and we offered suggestions for how the field of public health education can develop communities of learning devoted to supporting pedagogy. Our goal was to help advance an agenda of innovative evidence-based public health education, enabling schools and programs of public health to evaluate and measure success in meeting the current and future needs of the public health profession.

Translating evidence to policy

2013 ◽  
pp. 276-281 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lauren Smith ◽  
Jane An ◽  
Ichiro Kawachi
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Public Policy ◽  
Health Policy ◽  
Public Health Policy ◽  
Policy Making ◽  
Policy Formation ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
Research Findings

As a result of reading this chapter you will be more able to identify the challenges that arise in translating research findings to public policy, understand the frequently cited barriers to evidence-based public health policy making from the perspective of legislators, and take steps to bridge the gap between evidence and policy formation.

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