Dear Students,
Dr. Andsager is a new faculty member in the School of Journalism & Electronic Media, teaching a graduate seminar on Media and Health this semester. If you are interested, please see the course description below and contact Dr. Andsager.
Seminar: Mass Media and Health Communication
JREM 556:01
Tuesdays 5:05-7:30
COM 314
The media are the public’s primary source of health information. News media warn of potential epidemics, provide news about recent medical developments, and inform us about celebrities diagnosed with disease. Entertainment media construct illness and treatment, while perhaps shaping our expectations about physicians and healthcare workers. Social media have the capacity to influence health knowledge and decisions in a myriad ways.
This seminar will examine how and why media construct health and medicine in the ways that they do and how audiences process those messages. We will explore mediated health from theoretical perspectives such as cultivation, social comparison, agenda setting, priming, social cognitive theory, and more.
Course Objectives :
To understand how news media, entertainment media, and social media contribute to public knowledge and attitudes regarding health and medical issues.
To understand the constraints under which various media operate in reporting and explaining health issues.
To understand how entertainment media shape perceptions about health and medical issues.
To understand the theoretical explanations for how audiences use and process mediated health messages.
Julie Andsager
Professor
School of Journalism & Electronic Media
University of Tennessee
333 Communications Building
Knoxville, TN 37996-0333
865.974.4452