Science communication on Twitter: Measuring indicators of engagement and their links to user interaction in communication scholars' Tweet content.

Scientists increasingly use Twitter for communication about science. The microblogging service has been heralded for its potential to foster public engagement with science; thus, measuring how engaging, that is dialogue-oriented, tweet content is, has become a relevant research object. Tweet content designed in an engaging, dialogue-oriented way is also supposed to link to user interaction (e.g. liking, retweeting). The present study analyzed content-related and functional indicators of engagement in scientists' tweet content, applying content analysis to original tweets (n = 2884) of 212 communication scholars. Findings show that communication scholars tweet mostly about scientific topics, with, however, low levels of engagement. User interaction, nevertheless, correlated with content-related and functional indicators of engagement. The findings are discussed in light of their implications for public engagement with science.

Novel interfaces in science communication: Comparing journalistic and social media uptake of articles published by The Conversation Africa.

Science amplifier platforms such as The Conversation have gained popularity in a changing media ecosystem in which the traditional roles of journalists are eroded, and scientists are urged to engage with society. The Conversation constitutes a blend of scientific communication, public science communication and science journalism, and a convergence of the professional worlds of science and journalism. In this study, we investigated the nature and impact of the Africa-focussed edition of this platform, The Conversation Africa. We analysed articles published over a 5-year period since its launch in 2015 (N = 5392). Contents from South Africa dominate the platform, but contributions from other African countries are increasing. Regarding the role of The Conversation Africa as an inter-media agenda setter, mainstream media more often republished stories related to politics or economics, while stories about social issues such as education, conservation and art were more often shared on social media.

Framing as a Concept for Health Communication: A Systematic Review.

Over the past decades, research in the fields of both framing and health communication has grown exponentially. However, to date, no systematic review has been conducted about how framing - as a concept - has been used in health communication. The present study provides a systematic review of the current research, applying a quantitative content analysis to the published literature on framing in health communication. Articles published in peer-reviewed scientific journals (N = 316) were analyzed in order to describe common characteristics and topics, as well as the degree to which the sociological and psychological tradition of framing, different types of frames, and visual framing have been used. Furthermore, framing effect studies were examined to see whether they contained covariates, competitive frames, and/or gain and loss framing. The results reveal that the most common topics in the literature on framing in health communication were related to cancer, nutrition, and vaccination. Most articles use quantitative research designs, most commonly surveys with experimental designs; the majority of articles are based on the psychological tradition of framing. Thematic and generic frames occur almost equally, while the lack of research on visual frames is clearly noticeable. More than half of the effect studies test the effects of gain and loss framing, whereas competitive frames are under-studied. The results of this systematic review help to identify both current trends and research gaps on framing in health communication, and how it differs from framing in communication science overall - valuable information that can inform future research.

Promises and reservations towards science and technology among South African publics: A culture-sensitive approach.

Against the background that surveys measuring public perceptions of science and technology are often removed from cultural contexts and do not equally represent all regions of the world, this study investigated attitudes towards science and technology among different publics of the South African population. To apply a culture-sensitive approach, theoretical considerations of cultural distance were combined with methodological considerations of segmentation studies, and representative data (n = 3183) were reanalysed. The findings show that six South African publics can be distinguished, and that - despite the fact that all publics see more promises of science than reservations - there tend to be sensitive differences between these publics. In the long run, such findings might help to make science communication more effective.

Scientific evidence and mass media: Investigating the journalistic intention to represent scientific uncertainty.

Science journalists are responsible for the mass media's representation of life sciences (e.g. biotechnology, genetics, and nanotechnology) and for the depiction of research findings in these areas as more scientifically (un)certain. Although researchers have determined that the representational styles of scientific evidence vary among science journalists, the reasons for these differences have not yet been fully investigated. Against this background, for the first time, the present study applies a reasoned action approach and investigates the predictors of the journalistic intention to represent scientific uncertainty, using computer-assisted telephone interviews with a representative sample of German science journalists (n = 202). The results indicate that beliefs about the coverage of other media, perceptions regarding scientific uncertainty of the main field of coverage, perceived expectations of the audience, past behavior, and gender were the predictors that most strongly affected the journalists' intention to represent life sciences as more scientifically uncertain.

Effects of Valenced Media Frames of Cancer Diagnoses and Therapies: Quantifying the Transformation and Establishing of Evaluative Schemas.

Journalists portray health issues within different frames, which may shape news recipients' evaluations, attitudes, and behaviors. As the research on framing continues to face theoretical challenges and methodological concerns, this study examines the transformation and establishing of evaluative schemas, which are steps in the process toward attitudinal change. The study measures recipients' evaluations of actual television clips dealing with cancer diagnoses and cancer therapies. Two valenced (positive vs. negative) media frames were tested in a 3-week online panel (n = 298) using a pretest-posttest design with a German sample. The results offer limited support for the hypothesis that media frames transform participants' schemas, but do not support the hypothesis that new schemas are established in response to media frames. The study also investigates interactions between framing and participants' issue involvement, as well as between framing and topic-specific interest and media use.

Frames of scientific evidence: How journalists represent the (un)certainty of molecular medicine in science television programs.

For laypeople, media coverage of science on television is a gateway to scientific issues. Defining scientific evidence is central to the field of science, but there are still questions if news coverage of science represents scientific research findings as certain or uncertain. The framing approach is a suitable framework to classify different media representations; it is applied here to investigate the frames of scientific evidence in film clips (n=207) taken from science television programs. Molecular medicine is the domain of interest for this analysis, due to its high proportion of uncertain and conflicting research findings and risks. The results indicate that television clips vary in their coverage of scientific evidence of molecular medicine. Four frames were found: Scientific Uncertainty and Controversy, Scientifically Certain Data, Everyday Medical Risks, and Conflicting Scientific Evidence. They differ in their way of framing scientific evidence and risks of molecular medicine.

Classical homeopathy in the treatment of cancer patients--a prospective observational study of two independent cohorts.

BACKGROUND: Many cancer patients seek homeopathy as a complementary therapy. It has rarely been studied systematically, whether homeopathic care is of benefit for cancer patients. METHODS: We conducted a prospective observational study with cancer patients in two differently treated cohorts: one cohort with patients under complementary homeopathic treatment (HG; n = 259), and one cohort with conventionally treated cancer patients (CG; n = 380). For a direct comparison, matched pairs with patients of the same tumour entity and comparable prognosis were to be formed. Main outcome parameter: change of quality of life (FACT-G, FACIT-Sp) after 3 months. Secondary outcome parameters: change of quality of life (FACT-G, FACIT-Sp) after a year, as well as impairment by fatigue (MFI) and by anxiety and depression (HADS). RESULTS: HG: FACT-G, or FACIT-Sp, respectively improved statistically significantly in the first three months, from 75.6 (SD 14.6) to 81.1 (SD 16.9), or from 32.1 (SD 8.2) to 34.9 (SD 8.32), respectively. After 12 months, a further increase to 84.1 (SD 15.5) or 35.2 (SD 8.6) was found. Fatigue (MFI) decreased; anxiety and depression (HADS) did not change. CG: FACT-G remained constant in the first three months: 75.3 (SD 17.3) at t0, and 76.6 (SD 16.6) at t1. After 12 months, there was a slight increase to 78.9 (SD 18.1). FACIT-Sp scores improved significantly from t0 (31.0 - SD 8.9) to t1 (32.1 - SD 8.9) and declined again after a year (31.6 - SD 9.4). For fatigue, anxiety, and depression, no relevant changes were found. 120 patients of HG and 206 patients of CG met our criteria for matched-pairs selection. Due to large differences between the two patient populations, however, only 11 matched pairs could be formed. This is not sufficient for a comparative study. CONCLUSION: In our prospective study, we observed an improvement of quality of life as well as a tendency of fatigue symptoms to decrease in cancer patients under complementary homeopathic treatment. It would take considerably larger samples to find matched pairs suitable for comparison in order to establish a definite causal relation between these effects and homeopathic treatment.