Tag Archives: health

fat in the fire?

by chika on Jan 24, 2008 at 10:17 pm

Article: “Fat in the Fire? Science, the News Media, and the ‘Obesity Epidemic’.” Sociological Forum 23(1): 53-83.

Summary: Watch out for news reporting on weight gain and health crisis – you might be blaming yourself for recent weight gains more than you should. While the news media and medical science publications share much in their reports on obesity and health, news media dramatize the issue more, highlight our individual responsibilities more, and blame particularly the poor, racial minorities, and women more, Saguy and Almeling (Sociological Forum 2008) find. The exponential growths of reports on obesity and weight since 1980 are the same in both medical and news publications, but the news media have continued to beat the medical publication in the article counts since the mid-1990s. The expansion of media coverage and the preferred use of sensational words like “crisis” and “epidemic” might be flaring the issue of fat in the fire.

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Phone surveys in a wireless world

by meg on Jan 17, 2008 at 8:43 pm

Article: Coverage Bias in Traditional Telephone Surveys of Low-Income and Young Adults Public Opinion Quarterly, vol. 71, no. 5

Summary: This article finds that surveys that rely on traditional random-digit-dials of landlines have a significant bias in their information about low-income young people. Because 32% of low-income young adults live in households with only a wireless phone, telephone surveys that do not include cell phones will understimate the prevalence of binge drinking and smoking, but will overestimate obesity. These surveys will also underestimate physical activity and the prevalence of HIV testing. This article is part of a special issue on telephone surveys and cell phones in the United States.

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