publications

BMSG's issue series

Circulating health: From research to practice: New collaborations, new ways of mediatizing health?

Monday, July 24, 2017

In this panel as part of the 2017 Circulating Health Conference hosted by the U.C. Berkeley Center for Social Medicine, BMSG Director Lori Dorfman discusses the intersection between media and public health, including the role environments and policy play in shaping population health; the way the news influences people’s understanding of issues that affect health; and how health is framed in the media ‰— often as an outcome of individual behavior, rather than social factors. Dr. Dorfman also explains the difference between media advocacy and social marketing, and she highlights the role of journalism in holding government accountable for its actions that impact health.

The shift in framing of food and beverage product reformulation in the United States from 1980 to 2015

Thursday, June 08, 2017

Food and beverage product reformulation is a nutrition policy strategy that has the potential to benefit public health and the food and beverage industry. However, reformulation has also been criticized as being driven by industry interests. In this article for Critical Public Health, Courtney Scott and BMSG’s Laura Nixon investigate how and why reformulation became a public health initiative and uncover important context for debates on voluntary initiatives.

Video: The Berkeley sugar-sweetened beverage tax: A transdisciplinary approach to evaluating the impact

Tuesday, May 23, 2017

In November 2014, voters in Berkeley, California, overwhelmingly approved a measure to tax sugary drinks. In this video, BMSG‰’s Laura Nixon and U.C. Berkeley‰’s Karen Sokal-Gutierrez discuss research on the soda tax, including how public debate surrounding it appeared in the media, what parents of young children think about sugary drinks and efforts to tax them, and how advocates can harness lessons from Berkeley to help pass sugar-sweetened beverage taxes in other locations.

Lori Dorfman speaking at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health

Beyond Brexit, the elections & false news: Implications of the changing information ecosphere for health promotion, policy & advocacy

Wednesday, May 17, 2017

BMSG Director Lori Dorfman moderates “Beyond Brexit, the Elections & False News: Implications of the Changing Information Ecosphere for Health Promotion, Policy & Advocacy,” a panel discussion held in May 2017 at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. The panel was organized by David Jernigan, an associate professor in the Department of Health, Behavior and Society and features the Center for Digital Democracy’s Jeff Chester, who investigates how marketers collect and use our data; Daniel Kreiss, who has been exploring how social media systems influence political debates; Jonathan Albright, who has extensively researched the influence of fake news; and American University’s Kathryn Montgomery, who studies the promises — and pitfalls — of using wearable devices to collect individual consumers’ health data.

Countermarketing alcohol and unhealthy food: An effective strategy for preventing noncommunicable diseases? Lessons from tobacco

Tuesday, May 02, 2017

Countermarketing campaigns, an effective component of comprehensive tobacco control, use health communications to reduce the demand for unhealthy products by exposing industry motives and undermining producers’ marketing practices. Could countermarketing campaigns also be used to reduce the consumption of alcohol and unhealthy foods? This review describes common elements of tobacco countermarketing and assesses the strategy’s potential for being applied to other public health endeavors.

Issue 23: Shaping stigma: An analysis of mainstream print and online news coverage of abortion, 2014-2015

Tuesday, January 31, 2017

Abortion is one of the safest, most common medical procedures, yet it remains shrouded in shame, stigma and controversy. To learn more about the possible role of media in reflecting and reinforcing this stigma, BMSG, in collaboration with our partners at Sea Change, analyzed blogs, op-eds, news articles and other media coverage of the abortion. In this Issue, we share our findings, along with recommendations for advocates and journalists to improve coverage.

War is not the answer: Framing collective action for road safety

Thursday, January 19, 2017

News about traffic safety often portrays the issue as a battle in which every road user must look out for him or herself. This characterization undermines equity and shared action. In this Framing Brief, we explore the nuances of the divisive frame and identify ways that traffic safety advocates can move the conversation toward community, cohesion and shared action for safety.

Examining the public debate on school food nutrition guidelines: Findings and lessons learned from an analysis of news coverage and legislative debates

Thursday, December 22, 2016

Understanding how school nutrition has been portrayed in the news is key for advocates working to build support around the country for policies that promote and maintain healthy school environments. This study, conducted in collaboration with the Public Health Advocacy Institute, provides a look at how discussions of school food nutrition policies unfolded in the selected states in the wake of a landmark national policy ‰— the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act.

Investigating the digital path to purchase for food and beverages: A research agenda for the modern marketing age

Tuesday, December 20, 2016

Food, beverage, restaurant and entertainment companies are increasingly harnessing Big Data to target consumers in retails settings, yet researchers do not know how their tactics influence diets and community health. To help close that knowledge gap, this memo reviews existing literature on food- and beverage-related digital marketing strategies and outlines recommendations for future research.

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