Are DTC TV Ads “Scaring” Patients?
A recent BBC article (“Medicine Information Leaflets ‘Too Scary’ says Experts”) illustrated how word choice and framing of side effects on drug inserts may sway patients towards not taking their medication. But why? The Academy of Medical Sciences report, which the BBC quotes, shares that patients may be confused, anxious, and/or off-put by the current way side effects are labeled “possible” or “serious” with little further explanation.
This got us thinking, how many times have you seen a commercial for a prescription drug (aka a DTC TV Ad) and not noticed the portion that’s dedicated to listing the side effects? Does this medium “scare” patients too?
Ling 101: Power and Agency
Welcome back!
At this point, we’ve covered a good amount of ground on the basics of healthcare discourse analysis.
Namely we’ve talked about how linguistics:
- is integral to good market understanding,
- can shape understanding with footing and alignment
- has rules that we can break or follow
But what about power and control?
Ling 101: How to Decode Conversational Roles
Last month we shared with you how certain linguistic methodologies can provide meaningful content to shape your marketing decisions. Now that you know how linguistics can be applied, let’s dive deeper and talk more about the first big idea of discourse analysis.
Discourse analysis at it’s core can be defined as studying the way language is used in context. Instead of just knowing what it is and how discourse analysis can be useful for you, we decided to break it down even further in a mini-series called “Ling 101”. You’re welcome!
Solving Your Marketing Problems with Linguistics
When you ask a linguist what the most common question they get asked is, you’re most likely going to hear “how many languages do you speak?” This questions isn’t a bad or wrong question, but it showcases how focused the image of linguistics is to many people. I mean, just take a quick search for “linguistic jobs” and you’ll see many of them are translation/transcription work. This idea is definitely in need of a refresh.
