What cancer research makes the news? A quantitative analysis of online news stories that mention cancer studies

Abstract

Journalists’ health and science reporting aid the public’s direct access to research through the inclusion of hyperlinks leading to original studies in peer-reviewed journals. While this effort supports the US-government mandate that research be made widely available, little is known about what research journalists share with the public. This cross-sectional exploratory study characterises US-government-funded research on cancer that appeared most frequently in news coverage and how that coverage varied by cancer type, disease incidence and mortality rates. The subject of analysis was 11436 research articles (published in 2016) on cancer funded by the US government and 642 news stories mentioning at least one of these articles. Based on Altmetric data, researchers identified articles via PubMed and characterised each based on the news media attention received online. Only 1.88% (n = 213) of research articles mentioning US government-funded cancer research included at least one mention in an online news publication. This is in contrast to previous research that found 16.8% (n = 1925) of articles received mention by online mass media publications. Of the 13 most common cancers in the US, 12 were the subject of at least one news mention; only urinary and bladder cancer received no mention. Traditional news sources included significantly more mentions of research on common cancers than digital native news sources. However, a general discrepancy exists between cancers prominent in news sources and those with the highest mortality rate. For instance, lung cancer accounted for the most deaths annually, while melanoma led to 56% less annual deaths; however, journalists cited research regarding these cancers nearly equally. Additionally, breast cancer received the greatest coverage per estimated annual death, while pancreatic cancer received the least coverage per death. Findings demonstrated a continued misalignment between prevalent cancers and cancers mentioned in online news media. Additionally, cancer control and prevention received less coverage from journalists than other cancer continuum stages, highlighting a continued underrepresentation of prevention-focused research. Results revealed a need for further scholarship regarding the role of journalists in research dissemination.

Identifying science in the news: An assessment of the precision and recall of Altmetric.com news mention data

“…Other news-focused studies have used Altmetric to not only identify the amount of coverage that research outputs receive but to generate corpora of stories that can later be analyzed to understand how journalists portray those outputs. Using this approach, Moorhead et al ( 2021 ) found that traditional, legacy news sources included significantly more mentions of research on common cancers than digital native news sources. Matthias et al ( 2020 ) used Altmetric data to identify and analyze mentions of research on opioid-related disorders in US and Canadian media, finding that this research was most often portrayed as “valid science”, with little discussion of study methods or limitations.…”

Mindful mindfulness reporting: Media portrayals of scientific evidence for meditation mobile apps

“…Two-thirds also fail to include a comment from an independent source or expert (Bonevski et al, 2008). Although media reports on CAM and novel biotechnologies can be overly positive, examples of balanced media reporting can be found for conventional biomedical topics, which commonly use findings from research, quantitative data and expert opinion (Amberg and Saunders, 2020; Hallin et al, 2013; Moorhead et al, 2021). For example, the majority of news reporting on genetic research accurately portrays the findings of scientific articles (Bubela and Caulfield, 2004).…”

Analysis of newspaper coverage of world cancer day: A study of select newspapers in Nigeria

“…The findings of this study trigger the desire of the current researcher to examine how the media cover events of the world cancer day to know if it is enough to generate public awareness creation on cancer related issues in the country. Moorhead et al (2021) in a cross-sectional exploratory study examined the coverage of cancer in newspapers paying attention to how the coverage varied by cancer type, disease incidence and mortality rates. From a total of 11436 research articles (published in 2016) on cancer funded by the US government, the type of cancer that dominated the coverage in the area was cancer of the lung.…”