The media logic of health journalism: Strategies and limitations in covering social determinants

Abstract

This study explores challenges faced by health journalists resulting from the demands of media logic (Altheide and Snow, 1979; 1991; 2013), a conceptual framework that describes a routinised, habitual means of constructing media messages. Through 17 in-depth interviews, US health journalists considered how they might improve health news reporting. This research investigates how media logic has affected journalists' abilities to cover health realities, including decisions they make to accommodate media logic formats and perceptions about audience interpretations. One pattern is the focus on individual determinants of health, which precludes the exploration of fundamental, complex, socially determined causes of health problems. Through discussing barriers and prevailing norms of newswork, the research uncovers limitations of media logic that are more ideological than structural, exposes critiques of the journalistic culture that media logic fosters, and presents opportunities for challenging these standards. This research supports the idea that news-making structures, including media funding, ownership and audience capital, reify problems in public understanding of health determinants.