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Biological, Chemical, and Nutritional Food Risks and Food Safety Issues From Italian Online Information Sources: Web Monitoring, Content Analysis, and Data Visualization

BACKGROUND: With rapid evolution of the internet and web 2.0 apps, online sources have become one of the main channels for most people to seek food risk information. Thus, it would be compelling to analyze the coverage of online information sources related to biological, chemical, and nutritional fo...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Tiozzo, Barbara, Ruzza, Mirko, Rizzoli, Valentina, D'Este, Laura, Giaretta, Mosè, Ravarotto, Licia
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: JMIR Publications 2020
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7769687/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33315018
http://dx.doi.org/10.2196/23438
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author Tiozzo, Barbara
Ruzza, Mirko
Rizzoli, Valentina
D'Este, Laura
Giaretta, Mosè
Ravarotto, Licia
author_facet Tiozzo, Barbara
Ruzza, Mirko
Rizzoli, Valentina
D'Este, Laura
Giaretta, Mosè
Ravarotto, Licia
author_sort Tiozzo, Barbara
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: With rapid evolution of the internet and web 2.0 apps, online sources have become one of the main channels for most people to seek food risk information. Thus, it would be compelling to analyze the coverage of online information sources related to biological, chemical, and nutritional food risks, and related safety issues, to understand the type of content that online readers are exposed to, possibly influencing their perceptions. OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to identify the types of online sources that are predominantly covering this theme, and the topics that have received the most attention in terms of coverage and engagement on social media. METHODS: We performed an analysis of big data related to food risks by combining web monitoring techniques, content analysis, and data visualization of a large amount of unstructured text. Using a dictionary-based approach, a web monitoring app was instructed to automatically collect web content referring to the food risk and safety field. Data were retrieved from March 2017 to February 2018. The validated corpus (N=12,163) was subject to automatic and manual content analysis. Results were combined with descriptive statistics extracted from Web-Live and processed with Qlik Sense. RESULTS: Nutritional risks and news about outbreaks, controls, and alerts were the most widely covered topics. Thematic sources devoted major attention to nutritional topics, whereas national sources covered food risks, especially during food emergencies. Regarding engagement on social media, readers’ interest was higher for nutritional topics and animal welfare. Although traditional sources still publish a great amount of content related to food risks and safety, new mediators have emerged as alternative sources for food risk information. CONCLUSIONS: This mixed methodological approach was demonstrated to be a useful means for obtaining an accurate characterization of the online discourse on food risks, and can provide insight into how the monitored sources contribute to the process of risk communication.
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spelling pubmed-77696872020-12-29 Biological, Chemical, and Nutritional Food Risks and Food Safety Issues From Italian Online Information Sources: Web Monitoring, Content Analysis, and Data Visualization Tiozzo, Barbara Ruzza, Mirko Rizzoli, Valentina D'Este, Laura Giaretta, Mosè Ravarotto, Licia J Med Internet Res Original Paper BACKGROUND: With rapid evolution of the internet and web 2.0 apps, online sources have become one of the main channels for most people to seek food risk information. Thus, it would be compelling to analyze the coverage of online information sources related to biological, chemical, and nutritional food risks, and related safety issues, to understand the type of content that online readers are exposed to, possibly influencing their perceptions. OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to identify the types of online sources that are predominantly covering this theme, and the topics that have received the most attention in terms of coverage and engagement on social media. METHODS: We performed an analysis of big data related to food risks by combining web monitoring techniques, content analysis, and data visualization of a large amount of unstructured text. Using a dictionary-based approach, a web monitoring app was instructed to automatically collect web content referring to the food risk and safety field. Data were retrieved from March 2017 to February 2018. The validated corpus (N=12,163) was subject to automatic and manual content analysis. Results were combined with descriptive statistics extracted from Web-Live and processed with Qlik Sense. RESULTS: Nutritional risks and news about outbreaks, controls, and alerts were the most widely covered topics. Thematic sources devoted major attention to nutritional topics, whereas national sources covered food risks, especially during food emergencies. Regarding engagement on social media, readers’ interest was higher for nutritional topics and animal welfare. Although traditional sources still publish a great amount of content related to food risks and safety, new mediators have emerged as alternative sources for food risk information. CONCLUSIONS: This mixed methodological approach was demonstrated to be a useful means for obtaining an accurate characterization of the online discourse on food risks, and can provide insight into how the monitored sources contribute to the process of risk communication. JMIR Publications 2020-12-14 /pmc/articles/PMC7769687/ /pubmed/33315018 http://dx.doi.org/10.2196/23438 Text en ©Barbara Tiozzo, Mirko Ruzza, Valentina Rizzoli, Laura D'Este, Mosè Giaretta, Licia Ravarotto. Originally published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research (http://www.jmir.org), 14.12.2020. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work, first published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research, is properly cited. The complete bibliographic information, a link to the original publication on http://www.jmir.org/, as well as this copyright and license information must be included.
spellingShingle Original Paper
Tiozzo, Barbara
Ruzza, Mirko
Rizzoli, Valentina
D'Este, Laura
Giaretta, Mosè
Ravarotto, Licia
Biological, Chemical, and Nutritional Food Risks and Food Safety Issues From Italian Online Information Sources: Web Monitoring, Content Analysis, and Data Visualization
title Biological, Chemical, and Nutritional Food Risks and Food Safety Issues From Italian Online Information Sources: Web Monitoring, Content Analysis, and Data Visualization
title_full Biological, Chemical, and Nutritional Food Risks and Food Safety Issues From Italian Online Information Sources: Web Monitoring, Content Analysis, and Data Visualization
title_fullStr Biological, Chemical, and Nutritional Food Risks and Food Safety Issues From Italian Online Information Sources: Web Monitoring, Content Analysis, and Data Visualization
title_full_unstemmed Biological, Chemical, and Nutritional Food Risks and Food Safety Issues From Italian Online Information Sources: Web Monitoring, Content Analysis, and Data Visualization
title_short Biological, Chemical, and Nutritional Food Risks and Food Safety Issues From Italian Online Information Sources: Web Monitoring, Content Analysis, and Data Visualization
title_sort biological, chemical, and nutritional food risks and food safety issues from italian online information sources: web monitoring, content analysis, and data visualization
topic Original Paper
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7769687/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33315018
http://dx.doi.org/10.2196/23438
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