The power of the media to shape our beliefs is the power to define a ‘brave new’ future we may not even want.

By Barbara McAdorey

The media holds a lot of power. What reporters choose to report, what they choose to ignore, and what interpretation they put on a news story all impact our understanding of the world, shaping a “reality” which may or may not be based on fact. Such power to mould how citizens think, and subsequently behave, is not itself good or bad. But “news” becomes a problem, as Nelson and Fleras point out in their book Social Problems in Canada ( p. 293), when “it detracts from fostering a democratic society of critically informed citizens”; when it “provides a largely one-sided point of view rather than balanced coverage.”

The authors go on to stress that our dependence on the media for “reality construction” is more pronounced when we are unable to experience events for ourselves. In the field of scientific and medical research, and specifically stem cell research, the direct experiences of most ordinary citizens is limited, and so we tend to rely on the media to educate us about this research which we are told will lead to finding cures for various diseases.

Bill C-13, The Assisted Human Reproduction Act — a controversial Bill which, among other things, would sanction and set limits on stem cell research using human embryos — was passed in the House of Commons on October 28. It is controversial because embryonic stem cell research (ESCR) destroys human life in the earliest stages of development. Do most Canadians support this type of research?

You would probably think so after reading the Ottawa Citizen’s front-page coverage of a recent Pollara poll. “Canadians embrace stem cell research: Poll finds solid support for funding studies on surplus embryos,” headlines Norma Greenaway’s October 14 report.

According to the Statement of Principles posted on the Canadian Association of Journalists’ website, and confirmed by CAJ president Paul Schneidereit, when publishing the results of an opinion poll, a journalist should always report the full context of the poll including who commissioned it and the polling questions asked. This is important so that readers can judge the validity of a poll for themselves.

The National Council on Public Polls (NCPP) in the US says that journalists reporting poll results should always find out what polling questions were asked because the wording of the question affects the results obtained. For sensitive questions, the NCPP recommends the exact wording of the questions be published and the results of different polls from different organizations be compared. NCPP encourages research organizations to ensure that any publication of poll results by the media contain the name of the organization which sponsored the study.

ESOMAR, The World Association of Opinion and Marketing Research Professionals (whose mission includes promoting the use of opinion research for improving decision making in society, worldwide), in its International Code of Practice for the Publication of Public Opinion Poll Results, states that poll results published in print media should be accompanied by the exact wording of the questions asked in order to avoid ambiguity.

The Citizen’s coverage of the Pollara poll did not contain the polling questions asked, the actual results obtained (the distribution of responses), or the name of the organization which commissioned the study.

Instead, readers were given The Citizen’s interpretation of the results. “There is solid and broad public support for embryonic stem cell research in Canada,” reads the opening line of the article. It goes on to state that “57 per cent of those surveyed approve of allowing stem cell research on human embryos that are either left over from fertility treatments or created for such research.”

According to Pollara chairman Michael Marzolini, the poll was commissioned by the National Post, who suggested the topic, and Pollara asked respondents: “Stem cell research involves the use of cells from human embryos to study human development, disease and treatment. These cells can be collected from different embryo sources, including those created specifically for research and those left over from fertility treatments. Given what you know about stem cell research, do you approve or disapprove of this type of science? Strongly or somewhat?”

The results were as follows: Strongly approve, 22%; somewhat approve, 35%; somewhat disapprove, 9%; strongly disapprove, 13%; don’t know or refused to answer, 20%. (Poll results do not always add up to 100% due to rounding.)

Only 22% of respondents “strongly approve” of ESCR, yet the Citizen’s interpretation is that 57% approve of it. The 35% of respondents who “somewhat approve” are lumped together with those who “strongly approve” and The Citizen implies this shows “solid” support.

What does “somewhat” mean anyway? If a glass is half-empty (or is that half-full?), then is it somewhat full, or somewhat empty? It would have been more accurate to conclude that 57% of Canadians do not fully approve of ESCR, (which includes all those who somewhat approve, somewhat disapprove, and strongly disapprove). But readers couldn’t come to this conclusion because the actual results were not reported.

That is why it is so important for the exact wording of the question and the distribution of answers to be published — so that readers can make their own interpretations and not rely on the biased ones of someone else.

Why would The Ottawa Citizen misrepresent the poll’s findings in this way? In fact, this misrepresentation was based on a polling question which was problematic to begin with — it was double-barrelled and omitted important information which, in all likelihood, would affect respondents’ answers.

Pollara actually asked two questions in one: basically, do you support research on human embryos which are left over from fertility treatments AND do you support research on embryos created specifically for research? What if a person supports one but not the other? Would she answer “somewhat approve,” or “somewhat disapprove,” or refuse to answer because she is frustrated with this double-barrelled question which does not allow her to answer each question separately? The more a question is subject to interpretation by the respondent, the more likely will the results be distorted.

With regards to the omission of important information, respondents were not told that: ESCR kills the embryo; alternative sources of stem cells exist— adult tissue and umbilical cord blood — and harvesting stem cells from these sources does not destroy human life; and no successful treatments have been attributed to stem cells from embryos. This means respondents were asked to give their opinion on something they probably did not fully understand. Because there is no way to assess how much knowledge the respondents had when they answered, we cannot assume their answers are measuring what we think they are measuring.

Thus the Pollara poll results cannot be relied upon to tell us very much about Canadians’ opinions on ESCR, including whether or not Canadians want to fund the procedure (the second question asked by Pollara whose results we also cannot trust because, like the first question, it is dependent on how knowledgeable respondents are about stem cell research). Yet The Ottawa Citizen, on its front page, made the sweeping claim that Canadians “embrace” this research and “solid”ly support funding it.

The Pollara story also appeared in The National Post, Calgary Herald, Edmonton Journal, Vancouver Sun and Vancouver Province, Regina Leader Post, Windsor Star, Kingston Whig Standard, and Montreal Gazette — ten papers in total, all of them owned by CanWest.

The Ottawa Citizen then failed to report the results of a Leger Marketing Poll, commissioned by LifeCanada, which found that when told about alternative sources of stem cells and that ESCR destroys the embryo, 70% of Canadians prefer stem cell research to be conducted using these alternate sources. (See Joanne Byfield’s article, p.1, “We are not alone: Canadians polled on life issues.”) Why did The Citizen and every other major English-language newspaper across the country ignore the poll results of Leger Marketing, a reputable research organization with membership in ESOMAR?

As the authors of Social Problems in Canada note, “Those in control of the media to a large extent define the beliefs, values, and myths by which we live and organize our lives.” (p. 316) If people read in their newspapers exaggerated claims based on inadequate research in the absence of the actual research results, they have no reason to doubt the veracity of such claims. In the further absence of any conflicting research findings, the reader is manipulated into believing what the media wants him to believe. That reader may second-guess his own views if he thinks most others don’t feel the way he does. If he and others alter their opinions based on misinformation, then the media succeeds in creating the reality it invented in the first place. If that reader is a politician whose vote on a particular piece of legislation is determined by what she believes is an accurate picture of public opinion, then the media succeeds in creating legislation the people didn’t want. —BM

Editor’s note: A shorter version of this article was submitted to the opinion editor of The Ottawa Citizen. It was rejected.