HIV/AIDS Mass Media Coverage and HIV-Related Discrimination in Turkey

Abstract

HIV/AIDS is one of the most stigmatizing medical problems in modern history. Social prejudices developed due to society’s real and unrealistic fears against the disease also caused negative attitudes such as stigma and discrimination. Stigma and discrimination suffered by people living with HIV/ AIDS can be considered a problem as impactful as the disease itself. Although much progress has been made on this issue, HIV positive individuals still face severe discrimination in their professional and social lives. The fear of discrimination not only reduces the quality of life of people but also causes HIV positive individuals to avoid diagnostic tests or treatment. Based on the premise mass communication reflects fundamental frameworks in how the contemporary world is seen and perceived by society, this study aims to observe general trends in the news and how discrimination against people living with HIV or AIDS is portrayed in the mass media. To determine the general trends, Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) topic modeling is applied to 770 news about AIDS or HIV published between 2010 and 2020, and a total of 6 general trends were obtained. Then, news containing discrimination and prejudice and social marketing campaigns are examined separately, and the perception of discrimination and stigma related to AIDS and HIV in the general population is discussed. © Peter Lang GmbH Internationaler Verlag der Wissenschaften Berlin 2021.