Framing Science: How Opioid Research Is Presented in Online News Media

Lisa Matthias; Alice Fleerackers; Juan Pablo Alperin

doi:10.3389/fcomm.2020.00064

Framing Science: How Opioid Research Is Presented in Online News Media

Lisa Matthias^*, Alice Fleerackers, Juan Pablo Alperin^*

^*Corresponding author for this work

Information Systems Science, Helsinki

Research output: Contribution to journal › Review Article › peer-review

11 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Popular news media play an instrumental role in shaping public perception of issues like the opioid crisis. Using a detailed coding instrument, we analyzed how opioid-related scholarly publications were covered in 149 news stories published by nine major US and Canadian online news outlets at the height of the crisis. We find that a small proportion of available studies receive coverage, mostly within issue-focused rather than science communication news stories. While most studies are framed as established "facts,"stories rarely provide sufficient information for news consumers to critically evaluate the validity of the research. Potential implications for science communication and public perception of the opioid crisis are discussed.

Original language	English
Article number	64
Peer-reviewed scientific journal	Frontiers in Communication
Volume	5
ISSN	2297-900X
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.3389/fcomm.2020.00064
Publication status	Published - 2020
MoE publication type	A2 Review article in a scientific journal

Keywords

512 Business and Management
Digital news
Framing
Health communication
Journalism
Opioid

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title = "Framing Science: How Opioid Research Is Presented in Online News Media",

abstract = "Popular news media play an instrumental role in shaping public perception of issues like the opioid crisis. Using a detailed coding instrument, we analyzed how opioid-related scholarly publications were covered in 149 news stories published by nine major US and Canadian online news outlets at the height of the crisis. We find that a small proportion of available studies receive coverage, mostly within issue-focused rather than science communication news stories. While most studies are framed as established {"}facts,{"}stories rarely provide sufficient information for news consumers to critically evaluate the validity of the research. Potential implications for science communication and public perception of the opioid crisis are discussed.",

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N1 - Funding Information: This research was supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada through an Insight Grant: Understanding the Societal Impact of Research Through Social Media (435-2016-1029). Publisher Copyright: © Matthias, Fleerackers and Alperin.

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N2 - Popular news media play an instrumental role in shaping public perception of issues like the opioid crisis. Using a detailed coding instrument, we analyzed how opioid-related scholarly publications were covered in 149 news stories published by nine major US and Canadian online news outlets at the height of the crisis. We find that a small proportion of available studies receive coverage, mostly within issue-focused rather than science communication news stories. While most studies are framed as established "facts,"stories rarely provide sufficient information for news consumers to critically evaluate the validity of the research. Potential implications for science communication and public perception of the opioid crisis are discussed.

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Framing Science: How Opioid Research Is Presented in Online News Media

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