by Christopher Pepper | Teen Health Today
Thursday, November 06, 2025
We know that SNAP is essential to public health, but talking about it can be tricky. A recent blog by BMSG provides guidance and sample language to help advocates effectively communicate the benefits of SNAP — and the consequences of its absence. This article in Teen Health Today utilizes the sample language put forth by BMSG.
by Gerald Farinas | GoPride
Friday, October 17, 2025
A new study from the Trans Journalists Association and the Berkeley Media Studies Group shows that most national news stories about anti-transgender executive orders in the early days of the second Trump administration failed to include voices from the transgender community.
by Lori Dorfman | The New York Times
Thursday, August 14, 2025
At BMSG, we often encourage advocates to craft messages that appeal to shared values like interconnection and to show how public health issues affect not just individuals but entire communities. So what does that look like in practice? In this letter to the editor for The New York Times, BMSG Director Lori Dorfman demonstrates these strategies as she describes the ripple effects of food stamps: When SNAP helps a parent put food on the table, she explains, it not only means their child can sleep well and learn in school the next day, it also means the grocery store cashier’s child can do the same.
by Roselyn Romero | Oaklandside
Tuesday, May 06, 2025
As elected officials in Oakland increasingly use social media, the city has borne the brunt of harmful online narratives, according to Pamela Mejia, director of research and associate program director at Berkeley Media Studies Group. Mejia has found that some local politicians or candidates for public office have shared “charged images” from social media aggregators that portray Oakland as lawless or out of control. Those officials or candidates will then point to those images “as proof of previous failures that they alone can rectify, or as an example of the kind of lawlessness they’re coming up against,” she said. As a result, people consuming those images tend to view the world as more dangerous than it actually is, even when crime rates are trending downward — a phenomenon media scholars call the “mean world syndrome.”
American Press Institute
Wednesday, February 19, 2025
A recently published guide from Berkeley Media Studies Group is designed for advocates who are trying to help the public understand firearm violence. But it can also help journalists, suggests Kaitlin Washburn, health beat leader for firearm violence and trauma at the Association of Health Care Journalists. The messaging guide includes an analysis of the kinds of “framing and reporting patterns often found in news reports on gun violence,” she writes.
by Kaitlin Washburn | Association of Health Care Journalists
Monday, February 17, 2025
Stronger news coverage of firearm violence broadens the public’s understanding of the issue and shapes how audiences understand potential solutions. A recent Berkeley Media Studies Group guide, created in collaboration with Hope and Heal Fund, helps to reframe the narrative on firearm violence and provide a roadmap for journalists looking to highlight solutions and spotlight the most impacted communities. The guide includes an analysis of the types of framing and reporting patterns found in coverage of firearm violence and identifies community-led prevention strategies that lend themselves to storytelling.
by Stephanie Rodriguez | SmartBrief
Monday, February 03, 2025
At a recent American Public Health Association webinar, BMSG’s Director of Racial and Health Equity Strategy, Dr. Katherine Schaff, shared tips for strengthening public health messaging. For example, before any messaging is released, public health professionals must form an overall strategy that considers wider goals, audience, narrative, and equity. “Before you know what you want to say, you have to know what you want to do,” she said.
by Gloria Oladipo | The Guardian
Saturday, December 21, 2024
Multiple studies have shown that white male perpetrators of gun violence, especially ones in high-profile incidents, are often depicted more compassionately by news outlets. An avalanche of media coverage of Luigi Mangione, the 26-year-old who allegedly shot and killed United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson, has attempted to understand what drove him to commit such a violent act. Speculation about complex motivations for crimes is a privilege not afforded to Black and Brown suspects, who are often reduced to racialized stereotypes in the news. “The overwhelming media narrative reinforces the idea that only certain people commit crime, then makes it seem like [it is] much more of an outlier when an affluent, white-presenting person commits a crime,” said Pamela Mejia, the director of research and associate program director at Berkeley Media Studies Group.
by Samantha Michaels | Mother Jones
Monday, November 04, 2024
As Republicans and moderate Democrats alike use inflated crime rhetoric to whip up support for anti-progressive causes, the public’s fear of crime is growing — and that perception may not match reality. One reason for increasing public concerns about crime is “mean world syndrome,” says BMSG’s Pamela Mejia: When people consume a lot of news about crime, they become convinced the world around them is a dangerous place. This article, which explores fear-mongering in the Bay Area, also appeared in Oaklandside.
by Jodi Hill-Lilly and Chip Spinning | The Imprint
Monday, September 30, 2024
This opinion piece argues for shifting the narrative surrounding the child welfare system, asserting that media can play an important role in improving the system by focusing on solutions. The authors cite a study finding from Berkeley Media Studies Group that a majority of reporters cover the child welfare system solely through a crime lens, arguing that coverage of the child welfare system must focus on not just the aftermath of tragedies, but on ways child welfare systems are supporting the shift to a preventative approach.
