IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jijerp/v16y2019i5p892-d213081.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Alcohol Industry CSR Organisations: What Can Their Twitter Activity Tell Us about Their Independence and Their Priorities? A Comparative Analysis

Author

Listed:
  • Nason Maani Hessari

    (Department of Health Services Research and Policy, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine; London WC1H 9SH, UK)

  • May CI van Schalkwyk

    (Department of Primary Care and Public Health, Imperial College London W6 6RP, UK)

  • Sian Thomas

    (Department of Public Health, Environments and Society, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London WC1H 9SH, UK)

  • Mark Petticrew

    (Department of Public Health, Environments and Society, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London WC1H 9SH, UK)

Abstract

There are concerns about the accuracy of the health information provided by alcohol industry (AI)-funded organisations and about their independence. We conducted a content analysis of the health information disseminated by AI-funded organisations through Twitter, compared with non-AI-funded charities, to assess whether their messages align with industry and/or public health objectives. We compared all tweets from 2016 from Drinkaware (UK); Drinkaware.ie (Ireland); and DrinkWise (Australia), to non-AI-funded charities Alcohol Concern (UK), Alcohol Action Ireland, and FARE (Australia). Industry-funded bodies were significantly less likely to tweet about alcohol marketing, advertising and sponsorship; alcohol pricing; and physical health harms, including cancers, heart disease and pregnancy. They were significantly more likely to tweet about behavioural aspects of drinking and less likely to mention cancer risk; particularly breast cancer. These findings are consistent with previous evidence that the purpose of such bodies is the protection of the alcohol market, and of the alcohol industry’s reputation. Their messaging strongly aligns with AI corporate social responsibility goals. The focus away from health harms, particularly cancer, is also consistent with previous evidence. The evidence does not support claims by these alcohol-industry-funded bodies about their independence from industry.

Suggested Citation

  • Nason Maani Hessari & May CI van Schalkwyk & Sian Thomas & Mark Petticrew, 2019. "Alcohol Industry CSR Organisations: What Can Their Twitter Activity Tell Us about Their Independence and Their Priorities? A Comparative Analysis," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 16(5), pages 1-12, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:16:y:2019:i:5:p:892-:d:213081
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/16/5/892/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/16/5/892/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Esser, M.B. & Bao, J. & Jernigan, D.H. & Hyder, A.A., 2016. "Evaluation of the evidence base for the alcohol industry's actions to reduce drink driving globally," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 106(4), pages 707-713.
    2. Hawkins, B. & McCambridge, J., 2014. "Industry actors, think tanks, and alcohol policy in the United Kingdom," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 104(8), pages 1363-1369.
    3. Florentine Petronella Martino & Peter Graeme Miller & Kerri Coomber & Linda Hancock & Kypros Kypri, 2017. "Analysis of Alcohol Industry Submissions against Marketing Regulation," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 12(1), pages 1-22, January.
    4. repec:aph:ajpbhl:10.2105/ajph.2016.303512_4 is not listed on IDEAS
    5. Babor, T.F. & Robaina, K., 2013. "Public health, academic medicine, and the alcohol industry's corporate social responsibility activities," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 103(2), pages 206-214.
    6. Sinnenberg, L. & Buttenheim, A.M. & Padrez, K. & Mancheno, C. & Ungar, L. & Merchant, R.M., 2017. "Twitter as a tool for health research: A systematic review," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 107(1), pages 1-8.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Clare, Kathryn & Maani, Nason & Milner, James, 2022. "Meat, money and messaging: How the environmental and health harms of red and processed meat consumption are framed by the meat industry," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 109(C).
    2. Charles D. H. Parry & Niamh Fitzgerald, 2020. "Special Issue: Alcohol Policy and Public Health—Contributing to the Global Debate on Accelerating Action on Alcohol," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(11), pages 1-7, May.
    3. Ye Ye & Baichen Jiang & Binyao Ning & Xinjean Lim & Lijia Hu, 2023. "Does Price Matter in Mainland China? Examine the Factors Influencing Broiler Chicken Purchase Intention," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(4), pages 1-16, February.
    4. Vivian Lyall & Lindsay Wolfson & Natasha Reid & Nancy Poole & Karen M. Moritz & Sonya Egert & Annette J. Browne & Deborah A. Askew, 2021. "“The Problem Is that We Hear a Bit of Everything…”: A Qualitative Systematic Review of Factors Associated with Alcohol Use, Reduction, and Abstinence in Pregnancy," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(7), pages 1-24, March.
    5. Maria Margarida Paixão & Mélissa Mialon, 2019. "Help or Hindrance? The Alcohol Industry and Alcohol Control in Portugal," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 16(22), pages 1-10, November.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Eastmure, Elizabeth & Cummins, Steven & Sparks, Leigh, 2020. "Non-market strategy as a framework for exploring commercial involvement in health policy: A primer," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 262(C).
    2. Amir Haghighati & Kamran Sedig, 2020. "VARTTA: A Visual Analytics System for Making Sense of Real-Time Twitter Data," Data, MDPI, vol. 5(1), pages 1-25, February.
    3. Linda Hancock & Natalie Ralph & Florentine Petronella Martino, 2018. "Applying Corporate Political Activity (CPA) analysis to Australian gambling industry submissions against regulation of television sports betting advertising," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 13(10), pages 1-21, October.
    4. Luis-Millán González & José Devís-Devís & Maite Pellicer-Chenoll & Miquel Pans & Alberto Pardo-Ibañez & Xavier García-Massó & Fernanda Peset & Fernanda Garzón-Farinós & Víctor Pérez-Samaniego, 2021. "The Impact of COVID-19 on Sport in Twitter: A Quantitative and Qualitative Content Analysis," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(9), pages 1-20, April.
    5. Anni Arumsari Fitriany & Piotr J. Flatau & Khoirunurrofik Khoirunurrofik & Nelly Florida Riama, 2021. "Assessment on the Use of Meteorological and Social Media Information for Forest Fire Detection and Prediction in Riau, Indonesia," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(20), pages 1-13, October.
    6. Guangyu Hu & Xueyan Han & Huixuan Zhou & Yuanli Liu, 2019. "Public Perception on Healthcare Services: Evidence from Social Media Platforms in China," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 16(7), pages 1-10, April.
    7. Umar Ali Bukar & Fatimah Sidi & Marzanah A. Jabar & Rozi Nor Haizan Nor & Salfarina Abdullah & Iskandar Ishak & Mustafa Alabadla & Ali Alkhalifah, 2022. "How Advanced Technological Approaches Are Reshaping Sustainable Social Media Crisis Management and Communication: A Systematic Review," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(10), pages 1-26, May.
    8. Sibusiso Cyprian Nomatshila & Teke Ruffin Apalata & Sikhumbuzo A. Mabunda, 2021. "Perceptions of School Management on the Relationship between School Nutrition and Development of Non-Communicable Diseases in a Rural South African District: A Qualitative Study," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(1), pages 1-11, December.
    9. Miléna Spach & Antoine Pietri, 2018. "Is Heavy Drinking Always Profitable For Alcohol Industry? An Epidemic Framework For Alcohol Consumption [Le binge drinking est-il toujours profitable à l’industrie alcoolière ? Un modèle épidémique," Université Paris1 Panthéon-Sorbonne (Post-Print and Working Papers) hal-02867917, HAL.
    10. Lutz Bornmann & Robin Haunschild & Vanash M Patel, 2020. "Are papers addressing certain diseases perceived where these diseases are prevalent? The proposal to use Twitter data as social-spatial sensors," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 15(11), pages 1-22, November.
    11. Muhammad Imran & Umair Qazi & Ferda Ofli, 2022. "TBCOV: Two Billion Multilingual COVID-19 Tweets with Sentiment, Entity, Geo, and Gender Labels," Data, MDPI, vol. 7(1), pages 1-27, January.
    12. Enai Ojeda & Christian Torres & Ángela Carriedo & Mélissa Mialon & Niyati Parekh & Emanuel Orozco, 2020. "The influence of the sugar-sweetened beverage industry on public policies in Mexico," International Journal of Public Health, Springer;Swiss School of Public Health (SSPH+), vol. 65(7), pages 1037-1044, September.
    13. Hawkins, Benjamin & Durrance-Bagale, Anna & Walls, Helen, 2021. "Co-regulation and alcohol industry political strategy: A case study of the Public Health England-Drinkaware Drink Free Days Campaign," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 285(C).
    14. Julia Stafford & Tanya Chikritzhs & Hannah Pierce & Simone Pettigrew, 2021. "An evaluation of the evidence submitted to Australian alcohol advertising policy consultations," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 16(12), pages 1-16, December.
    15. Isaac Chun-Hai Fung & Jingjing Yin & Keisha D. Pressley & Carmen H. Duke & Chen Mo & Hai Liang & King-Wa Fu & Zion Tsz Ho Tse & Su-I Hou, 2019. "Pedagogical Demonstration of Twitter Data Analysis: A Case Study of World AIDS Day, 2014," Data, MDPI, vol. 4(2), pages 1-12, June.
    16. Marcus Vinicius Santos & Fernando Morgado-Dias & Thiago C. Silva, 2023. "Oil Sector and Sentiment Analysis—A Review," Energies, MDPI, vol. 16(12), pages 1-29, June.
    17. Campbell, Norah & Mialon, Melissa & Reilly, Kathryn & Browne, Sarah & Finucane, Francis M., 2020. "How are frames generated? Insights from the industry lobby against the sugar tax in Ireland," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 264(C).
    18. Sonja I. Garske & Suzanne Elayan & Martin Sykora & Tamar Edry & Linus B. Grabenhenrich & Sandro Galea & Sarah R. Lowe & Oliver Gruebner, 2021. "Space-Time Dependence of Emotions on Twitter after a Natural Disaster," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(10), pages 1-13, May.
    19. Miléna Spach & Antoine Pietri, 2018. "Is Heavy Drinking Always Profitable For Alcohol Industry? An Epidemic Framework For Alcohol Consumption [Le binge drinking est-il toujours profitable à l’industrie alcoolière ? Un modèle épidémique," Post-Print hal-02867917, HAL.
    20. Rima T Nakkash & Lilian A Ghandour & Nasser Yassin & Sirine Anouti & Ali Chalak & Sara Chehab & Aida El-Aily & Rima A Afifi, 2019. "“Everyone Has the Right to Drink Beer”: A Stakeholder Analysis of Challenges to Youth Alcohol Harm-Reduction Policies in Lebanon," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 16(16), pages 1-17, August.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:16:y:2019:i:5:p:892-:d:213081. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.