本ラボを修了した、早稲田大学大学院 政治学研究科ジャーナリズムコース 修士課程修了生の論文概要書です。
Author: Z.H. (2020年3月修了）
Abstract
In the past several years, complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) has been used more and more commonly in Western developed countries. According to the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH), Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), which exerted a huge impact on East Asian countries, like China, Japan and Korea, is defined as a kind of CAM1. Moreover, with Youyou TU awarded by Nobel Prize for the discovery rooted in Chinese herbal medicine, TCM has been brought to the forefront of global attention. TCM was included for the first time in the new version of International Classification of Diseases, ICD-11, approved by the World Health Organization (WHO) in 20192. However, there has not been enough scientific assessment regarding its safety and effectiveness. The risk of providing misleading information to the users of CAM, resulting in some patients refusing modern medical treatments, is a social problem (Sakigami et al., 2010). As the primary source of health information, mass media affects how the general public make sense of and utilize health services (Abelson & Collins, 2009). Therefore, how media shapes TCM will influence the public’s perception of it and even policy related to its development.
This study identified the frames used to portray TCM and analyzed the discourse of some frames in depth to observe how TCM has been shaped in Chinese and Japanese newspaper articles over the past two decades, in comparison with English coverage. Both traditional human-coding and computer-assisted content analysis of The People’s Daily, The Asahi Shimbun, New York Times and The Guardian, were conducted. As results, eight frames were observed in the Chinese, Japanese and English news articles and it was proved that the conflict frame which is observed in the media reports on CAM, is also used to compare TCM and western medicine. In the Chinese news articles, the development frame is dominant, followed by the medical frame and internationalization frame. In the Japanese news articles, the medical frame which focuses on medical function of TCM is the most prominent. In the English news articles the problem frame has been highlighted, with the discussion centered on the lack of scientific evidence and the use of TCM damaging wildlife. In addition to the debate on scientific nature, conflict frames were found in terms of debates on the differences in the theory, scientific nature, efficacy and attitude between TCM and the western medicine in the Chinese, Japanese and English news articles. Most of the English news articles questioned whether TCM is scientific or not. Chinese news articles show different focuses from the English news articles, paying more attention to the differences on the unique theory and efficacy of TCM. However, the Japanese news articles share similarities with both due to the long history of using TCM and the dominance of the western medicine at present.
This study made an attempt for comparative analysis of news frames in the health communication field and provided a lens for understanding the traditional medicine and Western medicine in Eastern Asian countries.