Topical Punch : Health Topics as Drivers of Idiosyncratic Reader Responses to Online News
Health Topics as Drivers of Idiosyncratic Reader Responses to Online News

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Bibliographic Details
Authors and Corporations: Suran, Melissa, Holton, Avery E., Coleman, Renita
In: Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, 91, 2014, 4, p. 725-739
published:
SAGE Publications
Media Type: Article, E-Article

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further information
Physical Description: 725-739
ISSN: 1077-6990
2161-430X
DOI: 10.1177/1077699014550093
published in: Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly
Language: English
Subjects:
Collection: SAGE Publications (CrossRef)
Table of Contents

<jats:p> Although scholars explore how news stories’ framing elements may affect reader responses, they have yet to examine how the topics of health-related articles affect those responses. By content analyzing three US newspapers’ online health content and reader comments, this study finds that certain health topics are idiosyncratic with reader responses. Readers reacted to personal health and obesity news with more episodic and gain-framed comments but relied more on loss frames when discussing chronic health issues. Readers also used more thematic frames in comments about mental illness. Health coverage related to politics and the government was associated with fewer episodic comments. </jats:p>