Public Sphere Research Articles

Tobacco industry narratives of e-cigarette use in the UK: a qualitative framing analysis.

Public health actors have expressed concerns over the entry of the tobacco industry into the UK e-cigarette market. It is important to be aware of the tobacco industry's involvement and stated aims for e-cigarettes in the UK, given their historical attempts to divert attention from and escape responsibility for the harms caused by combustible cigarettes. The use of e-cigarettes amongst young people in the UK has remained constant, despite the law prohibiting sales to adolescents and claims by manufacturers and others that they are designed solely as a tool to quit smoking. This study sought to examine how tobacco-related organizations in the UK e-cigarette market frame the use of e-cigarettes. Publicly available materials between September 2015 and June 2023 were collected from four transnational tobacco companies which have invested in the e-cigarette category, and from a UK e-cigarette trade association. A qualitative framing analysis of materials was conducted guided by relevant frameworks from the Commercial Determinants of Health literature. The analysis identified seven framings used by tobacco-related organizations relevant to e-cigarette usage in the UK. These were: co-opting of harm reduction; consumer choice; following the 'evidence'; insufficient evidence; the right kind of regulation; 'us' and 'them' rhetoric and marketing and advertising. By highlighting tobacco-related organizations' e-cigarette framings and contradictions, this study raises awareness of the rhetorical strategies used by the industry which aim to relegitimize tobacco companies in the political and public spheres.

The Chartist Press and the Emergence of a Plebeian Public Sphere: Doubleday's The Political Pilgrim's Progress and O'Brien's The Rise, Progress and Phases of Human Slavery

abstract: The early nineteenth-century radical press sparked an era of print culture that challenged the political economy of liberalism and created a counter-cultural, plebeian public sphere. The post-Napoleonic Wars economic crisis, the anti-New Poor Law movement, and the War of the Unstamped shaped an alternative anti-capitalist political economy and literature defined by working-class political identity and activism. This study examines working-class political economy popularized in the radical press, how it created a counter public sphere antithetical to liberalism, and how it conceptualized a society based on social, economic, and political equality. Featured texts include Thomas Doubleday's The Political Pilgrim's Progress in relation to the political-economy theories popularized by James Bronterre O'Brien in The Rise, Progress, and Phases of Human Slavery .

Conflicts of interest in submissions and testimonies to an Australian parliamentary inquiry on menopause.

Conflicts of interest (COIs) have the potential to create bias in research, policy and practice. Although disclosure cannot fully protect individuals and public policy from vested interests, it is an important step to support trust in scientific and public discourse, and transparency in decision-making. However, COIs are often unreported, underreported or difficult to identify. This study aimed to assess the extent to which COIs are voluntarily declared by those who make submissions to government inquiries relating to health, focusing on the 2024 Australian Senate inquiry into perimenopause and menopause. There was no guidance or formal requirement to provide COI declarations in written submissions to the inquiry. However, a statement about COI declarations was given by the Chair of the inquiry at the start of public hearings in which verbal testimony was given. All 284 written submissions and 163 verbal testimonies were reviewed to identify the number and nature of COIs declared. Only 1% of written submissions and 6% of verbal testimonies provided a COI statement. The amount and nature of information provided in COI declarations varied widely. To ensure transparency in decisions made as a result of public inquiries, governments should require that COIs be declared for all submissions. An explicit standardized guide is needed, with clear parameters about the type of detail needed for these declarations. Processes for dealing with COIs should also be clear in any reports or recommendations that are made from the evidence presented at such inquiries.

Mental, emotional and social dimensions of quality of life and their relationship with physical and functional status in adults with haemophilia

IntroductionA comprehensive treatment for patients with haemophilia (PwH) should focus on how the disease interferes with their mental, emotional and social environment to analyse if all the therapeutic efforts invested in their physical status have positive impact on a life worth living. AimTo analyse the correlation between the physical status of a cohort of adults with haemophilia and their mental, emotional and social states regarding their treatment modality; Also, to investigate which variables are most related to quality of life (QoL), joint health and emotional, mental and social states. MethodsIn this cross-sectional, 102 adults with haemophilia divided into a prophylactic group (G1, n = 77) and on-demand group (G2, n = 25) were included. Demographic and clinical characteristics, health joint (HJHS), presence of synovitis with ultrasound, self-perceived functionality (HAL) and QoL (A36-HaemoQoL), were analysed. ResultsIn G1 all the variables that defined the physical status correlated (rho: 0.33 to 0.72) to the mental and social spheres. The emotional state correlated with the self-perceived ones. In G2 physical status did not correlate with the three states. According to the regression models, HAL was the variable that most influenced the QoL (together with the bleedings in the last year, R2 = 0.61), emotional (R2 = 0.16), mental (together with HJHS, R2 = 0.41) and social states (R2 = 0.39). In addition, the HJHS was influenced by synovitis, HAL, mental health, age and the bleeding history (R2 = 0.83). ConclusionEmotional, mental and social states of PwH in prophylaxis are correlated to their physical status, being the self-perceived functionality the variable that most influenced in their QoL.

Is Fairyland for Everyone? Mapping online discourse on gender debates in Hungary

Abstract Over the past decade, Hungary has become a noteworthy example of democratic backsliding, marked by a pronounced shift towards conservative values and traditional gender roles within government policies. This trend, centred around Christian principles, has manifested in political campaigns actively opposing LGBTQ+ rights and the challenging of normative family structure. The resultant media campaigns and policy implementations have ignited extensive public discourse on gender and sexuality, prominently visible on social media platforms. This study conducts a qualitative analysis of the online discussion surrounding the LGBTQ+ children’s book, Fairyland Is for Everyone, to explore the contemporary gender discourse in Hungary. By examining social media comments under Hungarian online news articles, the research identifies three prevailing discursive lenses—heteronormative familism, neocolonialism, and diversity and inclusion—illustrating both the concurrent rise of anti-gender movements and the fortification of LGBTQ+ allyship in Hungary, while also considering broader transnational trends in LGBTQ+ rights and visibility.

Deep Faking in a Flat Reality?

In this article, we examine surprising examples of how AI-driven political entities integrate within the public sphere. We focus on an image illustration by The Guardian that depicts the US President Joe Biden alongside three agents of The Synthetic Party (Det Syntetiske Parti, DSP) from Denmark, focusing on the theme of deepfakes and elections. We argue that The Guardian’s portrayal of Biden/DSP highlights a paradoxical shift caused by what we call a ‘deep faking’ within a ‘flat reality.’ On this basis, we venture into a conceptually transversal intersection of geometry, politics, and art by interrogating the wide flattening of political realities — a transformation conventionally characterized by a perceived move from depthful, nuanced discourse to a landscape dominated by surface-level engagements and digital simulacra. We suggest that this transformation may lead to a new political morphology, where formal democracy is altered by synthetic simulation.

Sexual Violence in Higher Education: A Critical Discourse Analysis of University Policies

AbstractAs sexual violence has become increasingly visible in public discourse, scholarly research across disciplines has begun to critically examine how such cases are handled, ranging from the investigation processes, media reporting, and how the accused and accusing parties are impacted. While much of the existing linguistic research makes an important contribution to our understanding of the role of language in interpreting and evaluating sexual violence by focusing on the narrations of specific cases, one area of discourse that remains unexamined is that which is produced by those responsible for defining sexual violence and the protocols for investigating such cases. This study examines discourse on sexual violence found in US university policies and specifically focuses on contrasts between different discourse participants (i.e., faculty and students). Findings reveal that university policies frequently produce disparate discourse for students and employees that rarely acknowledge the hierarchical nature of faculty–student relationships. Given the increasing visibility of public discourse on sexual aggression and the power that such discourse has in influencing audiences, analyzing the linguistic strategies used to construct victims and perpetrators is crucial to our understanding of the various ways that sexual violence perpetuates injustice.

Debunking Three Myths About Misinformation

Recent years have seen a surge in research on why people fall for misinformation and what can be done about it. Drawing on a framework that conceptualizes truth judgments of true and false information as a signal-detection problem, the current article identifies three inaccurate assumptions in the public and scientific discourse about misinformation: (1) People are bad at discerning true from false information, (2) partisan bias is not a driving force in judgments of misinformation, and (3) gullibility to false information is the main factor underlying inaccurate beliefs. Counter to these assumptions, we argue that (1) people are quite good at discerning true from false information, (2) partisan bias in responses to true and false information is pervasive and strong, and (3) skepticism against belief-incongruent true information is much more pronounced than gullibility to belief-congruent false information. These conclusions have significant implications for person-centered misinformation interventions to tackle inaccurate beliefs.

Sharing without clicking on news in social media.

Social media have enabled laypersons to disseminate, at scale, links to news and public affairs information. Many individuals share such links without first reading the linked information. Here we analysed over 35 million public Facebook posts with uniform resource locators shared between 2017 and 2020, and discovered that such 'shares without clicks' (SwoCs) constitute around 75% of forwarded links. Extreme and user-aligned political content received more SwoCs, with partisans engaging in it more than politically neutral users. In addition, analyses with 2,969 false uniform resource locators revealed higher shares and, hence, SwoCs by conservatives (76.94%) than liberals (14.25%), probably because, in our dataset, the vast majority (76-82%) of them originated from conservative news domains. Findings suggest that the virality of political content on social media (including misinformation) is driven by superficial processing of headlines and blurbs rather than systematic processing of core content, which has design implications for promoting deliberate discourse in the online public sphere.

Using YouTube Comments Data to Explore Postpartum Depression in Social Media: An Infodemiology Study

Background: Postpartum depression (PPD) is a prevalent mental health issue profoundly impacting both parents and their families. This study examines YouTube comments to identify common public discourse and prevalent themes surrounding PPD. Methods: We analyzed 4915 comments from 33 YouTube videos to provide a comprehensive picture of PPD-related discourse on social media. We analyzed data using engagement metrics and Braun and Clarke’s thematic analysis. Results: The engagement metrics indicted that public discourse is primarily focused on the stigma associated with PPD in men and celebrities, with related videos receiving significant attention and high engagement metrics score. Thematic analysis revealed two themes: (1) perspectives of stigmatized, stigmatizer and people in between; and (2) adaptation despite adversity. Conclusion: This study provides key insights into public discourse on PPD. It highlights the importance of family and community support and advocates for a healthcare system capable of addressing the needs of stigmatized populations. A significant finding of this study is the call for action to raise awareness and debunk myths about PPD. Misconceptions worsen stigma and deter help-seeking by affected individuals. Awareness initiatives are crucial to enhance public understanding of PPD symptoms, its impact on individuals and families, and the importance of parental mental health.

The New Heideggerian Humanism

One of the defining inquiries of Heideggerian thought is whether traditional humanism has fulfilled its original purpose—namely, to humanize man as much as possible, to evolve his moral stance, as well as the mode of knowledge of human consciousness. Ontology, epistemology, and ethics—the three dimensions that could directly support the impact of the transformations dictated by the history of humanism—nevertheless reveal a regression, a deviation from the original goal. Thus, ontology reveals a distancing of man from Being and a stagnation within the realm of beings; epistemology indicates a focus of human knowledge on the mobility of beings, on the immanent, and on immediate everydayness; and ethics appears to be more of a framework of behavioral imperatives dictated by the public sphere. Instead of humanism, therefore, we will have, in Heidegger's view, humanisms—that is, ideologies and dogmatisms foreign to man's authentic mission, namely that of being the shepherd of Being, the protector dwelling nearby, situated in the proximal abode offered by the realm of meaningful discourse. Is it still possible for man to return to Being and inaugurate an authentic humanism? Before hastening to offer an answer to this inquiry, Heidegger urges us to linger further on the meaning of this question.

RACISM IN FOOTBALL: CONTRADICTIONS AND POSSIBILITIES FROM THE REGENCY IN THE PEDAGOGICAL RESIDENCE PROGRAM

This abstract exposes racism in football in a discriminatory way, with its implications in conscious or unconscious practices (Almeida, 2019). The topic was addressed in the training of students through Physical Education (PE) classes, in the Pedagogical Residency Program (PRP), of the Federal University of Alagoas - Arapiraca Campus, at the Aurino Maciel Field School, of the state network, in the city of Arapiraca-AL. General objective: to work on racism in football, with a view to overcoming racial discrimination in the social sphere. Specific objectives: to combat the different forms of prejudice existing in football practices; to identify stereotypes and position oneself critically in the face of prejudiced behavior; to respect the diversity of gender, ethnicity, among others. Methodology: approach of Critical-Overcoming PE (Coletivo de Autores, 2012) and method of social praxis of Historical-Critical Pedagogy (Saviani, 2021). Taking social practice as a starting and finishing point, starting from everyday practice and equipping students, aiming for catharsis (incorporation of the constituent elements of sports practice). Activities developed: seminars, guided study, individual and group work, and practical classes with simulations of racist acts. Conclusions: racism was and still is very present in our society, and this becomes contradictory due to the existing measures to criminalize this behavior. People still insist on committing acts of racial discrimination, through gestures towards athletes. Finally, we conclude that soccer was developed within a historical context marked by racial prejudice.

Demographic ageing and the protection of the older persons in contemporary legal systems

The essay aims to analyze, from a comparative law perspective, the impact of population ageing on traditional legal categories, highlighting the inadequacy of welfare systems and legal protection to meet the specific needs of the older persons, who seem relegated in a “grey area of the law”. The elderly represent a considerable and rapidly growing segment of the world’s population: this is not only a demographic data, but is even a “silent revolution” in society, with profound repercussions in the public and private spheres. Therefore, the research is aimed at investigating whether and to what extent the national traditional legal systems are capable of taking account of the problems connected with the ageing of the population and, in this way, of providing legal protection for the elderly operating in the legal environment. Underlying the issue of the protection of the older persons lies a fundamental dualism: on the one hand it seems essential to create specific protective instruments for the third age; on the other hand, the creation of a category to which a set of differentiated protections must be attached risks becoming blatantly discriminatory for those who, despite their age, retain their physical and intellectual faculties unaltered. Therefore, the essay analyzes some of the main areas in which the lack of specific recognition of the “weakness of the old age” emerges, such as the protective measure and the formation of contract, giving account of the general problems and the specific solutions adopted in different legal systems

ORGANIZATION OF CONSTRUCTIVE EMOTIONAL INTERACTION OF PRESCHOOLERS IN THE CONTEXT OF DIGITALIZATION OF EDUCATION

In the modern world, due to the rapid pace of information technology development and the great attention to this problem in the fi eld of education, the social and emotional spheres of human development are fading into the background. This implies the importance of developing social emotions in the context of digitalization of society. However, these processes can also coexist if the educational process is competently built, starting from preschool age. The purpose of this study is to identify possible ways of constructive interaction between adults and children, children with each other in the digital space, taking into account the inclusion of various types of joint activities for emotional interaction. The research used the following methods: test “Diagnosis of children’s abilities to partner dialogue” by A. M. Shchetinina; questionnaire for parents to determine computer addiction in older preschoolers by V. G. Pisarev. The study involved  children of senior preschool age. Based on V. G. Pisarev’s questionnaire, a questionnaire was created for parents to determine computer addiction. The pilot study showed that the level of social emotions in most children is at an average level, while the degree of computer dependence on the reaction of parents in most children is at a high level. This suggests the need to create effective pedagogical conditions for children to interact with peers and adults outside of digital activities. As a result, requirements and recommendations have been developed for further use both in professional activities by teachers and parents. The proposed methodological recommendations are aimed at developing the child’s social emotions, and the joint use of the material will lead to an even faster achievement of mutual understanding between an adult and a child within the framework of this task. The research was carried out with the support of a grant from the Russian Science Foundation № --, https://rscf.ru/project/--/.

The Cultural Importance of Integrating Socially Assisted Vulnerable Groups within Society – The Case of the Roma Community

This article aims to analyse the cultural importance of integrating Roma within society in the context of the continuous increase in the number of members of this minority in Romania's communities. The global community is increasingly open to cultural inclusion. Some forms of discrimination based on criteria such as religious affiliation, gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, age, disability, nationality, marital status and physical appearance seem to subside in intensity. The tolerance of individuals has increased considerably, and diversity is accepted, supported, encouraged and sometimes even imposed in order to build a globalized and inclusive society that respects diversity and provides equal opportunities for all, regardless of gender, race or socioeconomic status. However, the Roma remains a social category that hardly adapts to the majority's rules. In addition, Roma rights and freedoms are much less emphasized than the rights of other minorities in the European public discourse by politicians and social influencers. Thus, in this paper, we aim to emphasize the importance of integrating the Roma population within society, but also analyse one of the ways that would make this desideratum possible - launching a positive mass media campaign to highlight the cultural heritage of the Roma ethnic group.

Beyond homocolonialism: working towards queer decoloniality in Bangladesh

AbstractThe queer movement in Bangladesh suffered a crisis in 2016 with the murder of two activists, leading to an unwanted hyper-visibility in wider society, and a chilling effect on activism. We detail what it means to think beyond postcolonial critiques of international LGBTQ rights, briefly explaining the realities and limits of queer politics in Bangladesh, focusing on sexual health infrastructures and the emergence of legal citizenship for the “third-gender” hijra population. We argue that these dimensions of queer existence remain circumscribed, and that a public discourse of sexualities remains difficult to create as a terrain for equality. We explore whether the framing of ‘decolonial’ is useful here, conceptualized as a process of working through the postcolonial critique of western structures of financial and sexual frameworks, towards an understanding of crisis that requires reading colonialism in its later evolution in the context of nationalism, neoliberal development, and religious fundamentalism.

Reclaiming and remediating space: The dynamics of queer presence in audio drama platform

The censorship of Boys’ Love (BL) content in mainland China is marked by inconsistencies in both its intensity and scope. Amid these shifting regulatory boundaries, this study analyzes the systematic removal and occasional reappearance of visual BL content from the public sphere. We found that as visual channels are most susceptible to suppression, audio – though still monitored – emerges as a crucial medium, leveraging the agentive power of sound and media remediation to sustain fan engagement with BL narratives. Focusing on Miss Evan, a Chinese audio streaming platform, we explore how it navigates state censorship and market marginalization while restoring the BL subculture through innovative design features, sexually appealing voice performances, and provocative sound effects. Additionally, we investigate the agency of Chinese BL fans in reclaiming BL’s presence through polymedia engagement. We argue that the dynamic negotiation between the platform, state censorship, and fandom reveals an ongoing contest between queer marginalization and restoration. While the platform seeks mainstream acceptance by conforming to censorship through the minimization of queer visual representation, the BL fandom employs counterstrategies to sustain the subculture in audio form. This tension highlights the cultural resilience and technological adaptability of queer subcultures as they navigate and resist the censorship imposed by state and societal norms.

Politicising the Public Space: On Dalit Women Sanitation Workers in India

Caste determines the life worlds of people in India in particular and South Asia in general. Historically, it is observed that caste has conditioned the nature of public spaces. Upper castes can appropriate the public spaces legitimized by caste ideology and practice. However, colonial and post-colonial India witnessed changes in the caste system due to its (modern) legal interventions. Paradoxically, caste persists in its crude and subtle forms. It has also acquired new forms in post-independent public spaces. Caste determines certain bodily dispositions within the so-called public spaces. The ambiguous nature of modernity and the weight of tradition have drastically transformed the public space. A socially regulated economy and public institutions are determining the people, space, and mobility of the castes, too. This article investigates the nature of the stigmatized labour of Dalit women sanitation workers (who come under the manual scavenging community) within diverse public urban spaces. It analyses the various questions related to the Dalit women sanitation workers who work in select public universities, urban housing colonies, and slums in Delhi, India. It probes the Dalit women sanitation workers’ day-to-day life in caste-ridden spaces of urban- “public” spaces. One of the central questions that needs to be addressed is whether the socioeconomic space of these Dalit women workers has changed in contemporary India. Why do Dalit women have to do stigmatized work in public spaces? How are purity and pollution reinforced in elusive ways? Thus, it initiates a critique of the Indian feminist understanding of public spaces. This article acts as a way to engage with the epistemic priority of women sanitation workers to problematize Brahmanic feminism in India. Can there be any social-political engagement with the public space in the case of Dalit women sanitation workers? At the level of theory, this article critiques the dominant-Habermasian idea of the public sphere and Nancy Fraser’s counter-public to reflect on conceptual practice grounded in the Dalit women sanitation workers and public space.

Divergent values and perspectives drive three distinct viewpoints on grizzly bear reintroduction in Washington, the United States

Abstract The success or failure of apex carnivore reintroduction efforts can hinge on understanding and attending to diverse viewpoints of those involved in and impacted by reintroductions. Yet, viewpoints vary widely due to a suite of complex and intersecting factors, such as values, beliefs and sociocultural context. We ask, ‘what are the diverse viewpoints that exist surrounding apex carnivore recovery and what kinds of emotional, analytical and values‐based judgments might people use to construct their viewpoints?’ We used Q‐methodology to identify distinct, generalized viewpoints and areas of overlap and divergence between them, surrounding a proposal to reintroduce grizzly bears (Ursus arctos horribilis) to the North Cascades Ecosystem, USA. Q‐methodology combines qualitative and quantitative methods by asking purposefully sampled respondents to sort various statements on a given topic into an ordered grid. We found three distinct viewpoints among 67 respondents using factor analysis and responses to open‐ended questions about the sorting exercise. Two of these viewpoints represent essentially polarized perspectives corresponding to deeply normative notions about grizzly bear recovery, where one views reintroducing bears as a moral requisite, and the other views it as inappropriate and risky. These viewpoints primarily diverged on their perceptions of risk and perspectives about our collective responsibilities to and appropriate relationships with others (i.e. ‘relational values’). The third viewpoint was distinguished by its prioritization of practical considerations and views reintroducing bears as impractical and not sensible. Our analysis underscores the need to identify and attend to latent viewpoints that may be overlooked in the polarized public discourse as well as the multiple value systems and perceptions of risk that are integrated in perspectives on grizzly bear reintroduction. Additionally, our broadly defined identity groups were of very little utility in predicting viewpoints in this study, highlighting the importance of avoiding assumptions about people's views based on their identities and interests. We argue that forefronting conversations about responsibilities and appropriate relationships is critical for finding acceptable paths forward in such recovery efforts. We discuss the management implications of these findings for the North Cascades grizzly bear reintroduction, and for other large carnivore reintroductions. Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.

Rhetoric-Linguistic Analysis of Argumentation in Political Discourse

This paper delves into the fascinating world of argumentation in language, aiming to provide an in-depth analysis of argumentation strategies utilized in political speeches, to uncover the techniques employed by public figures to persuade, influence, and shape public opinion. This research examines the linguistic and rhetorical devices prominent in political discourse. By dissecting speeches from political contexts, the study reveals how politicians construct and present their arguments to advance their agendas. Through the exploration of persuasive language and emotional appeal, this paper offers insights into the art of rhetoric in the realm of politics. The findings highlight the intricate interplay between language, power, and public discourse, ultimately contributing to a nuanced understanding of the role argumentation plays in shaping political landscapes. The study aims at analyzing how the Toulmin model is used in conjunction with emotional appeal in political speeches, specifying the effect of the social relationships between the speaker and the audience on the way arguments are constructed and presented, and identifying the effects of the goals of the speech on the way arguments are constructed and presented. The data of the study includes YouTube videos of politicians` speeches. The study uses a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods to identify and analyze the method of arguing that is used, the strategies used to persuade the audience, and the rhetoric used to influence their effectiveness. The findings of the study show that the effectiveness of this arguing act is influenced by a number of factors, including the credibility of the speaker, the strength of the argument, and the social relations and common ground between the participants. The study also finds that emotional appeal is used to sway public opinion and advance political agendas.