Abstract
The popularization of ICTs and the availability of information have not influenced the habits of prevention - cancers are lately diagnosed, as before in the scarcity of information era. This paper analyzes patterns of accesses to the National Cancer Institute website (already described in previous articles) as well as contradictions between the purposes and results of cancer prevention campaigns. We identified a reactive pattern of queries which was indifferent to information on prevention, but interested in treatment technologies and news about celebrity's diseases. These findings contrast with the paradigm of the best data for decision making, based in the heteronomy of "banking education", its means and efficacy. We discussthe symbolic power of campaigns under the theoretical framework of emotional heuristic models - analytical tools rarely employed in studies of risks, but here considered essential elements to the comprehention of public perception of health. Ambiguities are portrayed and as well as its pendulum between certainties and uncertainties in the midst on which they are formed. It is discussed the risk tripartition - as perception, analysis and policy, the latest posed as a public clash between the first concerning the major risks aligned to their historical circumstances.
Highlights
Progress in IT and communication has developed as fast and as frequently as the changing implications that arise from it in the field of sociological observation
We identified a reactive pattern of queries which was indifferent to information on prevention, but interested in treatment technologies and news about celebrity’s diseases
We describe on the site of INCA27 traces of circles of attention linked to fictional items, and to events widely publicized in the media, such as: accesses to pages on prostate cancer, after the death of the Governor of São Paulo State (Figure 1)
Summary
Progress in IT and communication has developed as fast and as frequently as the changing implications that arise from it in the field of sociological observation. In relation to the quantity of accesses to information on health, the base of the Brazilian socio-economic pyramid has become increasingly narrow. Based on consultations of Google trends (open access) one sees the exponential growth of visits from the poorest regions of the country. Despite this wide access, little is known in the qualitative dimension about the social appropriation and practices. Those interested in ITCsas an intermediary for observation of social phenomena will certainly be interested by what is written below.
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