The role of the media in construction and presentation of food risks

Henderson, Julie; Wilson, Annabelle; Meyer, Samantha B.; Coveney, John; Calnan, Michael; McCullum, Dean; Lloyd, Sue; Ward, Paul

doi:10.1080/13698575.2014.966806

Cited by 35 publications

(20 citation statements)

References 35 publications

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“…This is supported by previous evidence about the important role of the media in reporting food scares (Henderson et al, 2014) and other health-related events (Gollust and Lantz, 2006, Hilton and Hunt, 2011, Gollust, 2012. This study highlighted relationships developed with a media actor, during times of non-crises.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 74%

How food regulators communicate with consumers about food safety

Wilson

Meyer

Webb³

et al. 2015

British Food Journal

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PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to report how food regulators communicate with consumers about food safety and how they believe consumers understand their role in relation to food safety. The implications of this on the role of food regulators are considered. MethodologyForty two food regulators from Australia, New Zealand and the United Kingdom participated in a semi-structured interview about their response to food incidents and issues of food regulation more generally. Data were analysed thematically. Originality/valueThere is a lack of information about how food regulators communicate with consumers about food safety and how food regulators perceive consumers to understand food regulation. It is this gap that forms the basis of this paper.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 74%

How food regulators communicate with consumers about food safety

Wilson

Meyer

Webb³

et al. 2015

British Food Journal

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Finally, the media plays an important role in drawing public attention to social issues, and public risk perceptions are influenced by the media's interpretive frames (Lockie 2006). Media coverage elevates the perceived magnitude of risk posed by various foods and diminishes institutional trust (Henderson et al 2012(Henderson et al , 2014. Therefore, we expect increased public awareness of food risks, as well as heightened public concerns, in places with greater media coverage of food risks.…”

Section: Contextual Influences On Food Risk Concernsmentioning

confidence: 98%

Public perceptions of food-related risks: a cross-national investigation of individual and contextual influences

Meagher

2018

Journal of Risk Research

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Public concerns about food risks have grown in recent decades in response to many food-related scandals. Despite some evidence that risk concerns vary across societies and risk domains, these variations remain understudied. To address this gap, this paper conducts a multi-level analysis of public concerns about biological and chemical/technical food risks in 26 European countries. Findings confirm previous work on individual predictors of risk concern and suggest that several contextual factors contribute to cross-national variations: aggregate perceptions of risks as unnatural, retail concentration in the food sector, and media coverage. The effect of institutional trust on risk concerns varies substantially across nations. Findings also reveal important differences in public concerns about biological versus chemical/technical food risks, supporting the view that food risk perception is multi-dimensional and complex.

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“…We analyse newspaper articles rather than literature specifically targeting expectant or new parents as these articles are intended for a broader audience and therefore are likely to reflect newsworthiness, issues that are of concern to the readership of the newspapers (see for example Henderson et al's (2014) analysis of the role of newsworthiness in the media representation of food risk and the ways in which it amplifies such risks).…”

Section: Methods Designmentioning

confidence: 99%

Liquid gold or Russian roulette? Risk and human milk sharing in the US news media

Carter

Reyes‐Foster

Rogers

2015

Health, Risk & Society

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The exchange of human breast milk, a common and well-established practice, has become a site of public controversy in the US. There is controversy over the use of the internet to facilitate milk exchange and public interest in the practice has been stimulated by a research article published in the journal Pediatrics that identified high levels of potentially harmful bacteria in breast milk sold online. In this article we use feminist critical discourse analysis to critically examine how breast milk sharing is represented in a sample of 30 articles from US print newspapers published in 2010-2013. We found complex and contradictory images of human milk, with medically supervised milk banks represented as a life-saving entity, nature's 'liquid gold', whereas peer sharing of breast milk was represented as dangerous, and in this context breast milk was represented as a potentially life-threatening substance. Women who donated milk to milk banks were represented as altruistic and those who obtained their babies' milk from the milk bank were represented as responsible and acting in the best interests of their babies. In contrast women who participated in peer milk sharing were represented at best as ill-informed about the risks to babies and at worst, morally reprehensible for disregarding the risks. Mothers who fed their babies this milk were represented as irresponsible and playing 'Russian roulette' with their babies. We argue that such contradictory representations are grounded in concerns in high income countries such as the USA with the control and surveillance of the female body through discourses of risk and are based on cultural constructions of individualism and intensive mothering. IntroductionIn this article we aim to examine how breast milk sharing is portrayed in popular media in the US. We draw on feminist critical discourse analysis to analyse newspaper articles about milk sharing to identify how milk sharing is represented in contemporary news media in the US. We selected US print newspapers with the top twenty highest circulation to focus on the articles that potentially have the greatest impact in shaping public perceptions. We analyse news media rather than parenting guides as the media has a broader reach and greater potential to shape general public perceptions. We aim to explore how milk sharing is represented through news media, focusing on distinctions between peer sharing and sharing through more formal milk banks. In this article we do not examine the ways in which such representation influence the readers of such media,

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The role of the media in construction and presentation of food risks

Cited by 35 publications

References 35 publications

How food regulators communicate with consumers about food safety

How food regulators communicate with consumers about food safety

Public perceptions of food-related risks: a cross-national investigation of individual and contextual influences

Liquid gold or Russian roulette? Risk and human milk sharing in the US news media

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