title: Including limitations in news coverage of cancer research: effects of news hedging on fatalism, medical skepticism, patient trust, and backlash.
abstract: Past research has demonstrated that news coverage of cancer research, and scientific research generally, rarely contains discourse-based hedging, including caveats, limitations, and uncertainties. In a multiple message experiment (k = 4 news stories, N = 1082), the authors examined whether hedging shaped the perceptions of news consumers. The results revealed that participants were significantly less fatalistic about cancer (p = .039) and marginally less prone to nutritional backlash (p = .056) after exposure to hedged articles. Participants exposed to articles mentioning a second researcher (unaffiliated with the present study) exhibited greater trust in medical professions (p = .001). The findings provide additional support for the inclusion of discourse-based hedging in cancer news coverage and suggest that news consumers will use scientific uncertainty in illness representations.
authors.affiliation: Department of Communication, and Oncological Sciences Center, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana, USA. jdjensen@purdue.edu
authors.forename: Jakob D
authors.initials: JD
authors.lastname: Jensen
authors.forename: Nick
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Carcioppolo
authors.forename: Andy J
authors.initials: AJ
authors.lastname: King
authors.forename: Jennifer K
authors.initials: JK
authors.lastname: Bernat
authors.forename: LaShara
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Davis
authors.forename: Robert
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Yale
authors.forename: Jessica
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Smith
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001294:Attitude to Health; D035843:Biomedical Research; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008402:Mass Media / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000523:psychology*; D035502:Trust; D035501:Uncertainty; D055815:Young Adult