Effects of Exposure to Conflicting Information About Mammography on Cancer Information Overload, Perceived...

Conflicting recommendations about mammography screening have received ample media coverage, emphasizing scientists' debate over the value of breast cancer screening and differences in professional organizations' guidelines about the appropriate starting age and frequency of routine mammograms. Whereas past research suggests that exposure to such media coverage of conflicting recommendations can have undesirable consequences, both on topic-specific (e.g., ambivalence about mammography) and more general outcomes (e.g., backlash toward cancer prevention recommendations), experimental evidence, especially for effects on more general health cognitions, is limited. Using data from a population-based sample of U.S. women aged 35-55 years (N = 1467), the current study experimentally tested whether exposure to news stories that varied in the level of conflict about mammography (no, low, medium, and high conflict) affected three general health cognitions-cancer information overload (CIO), perceived scientists' credibility, and perceived journalists' credibility. We further tested whether these effects varied by research literacy. Results showed that exposure to conflict increased women's perceived CIO and reduced their perceptions of journalists' credibility, and that these effects tapered off at higher levels of conflict. Exposure to conflict also reduced perceptions of scientists' credibility, but only among participants with lower levels of research literacy. Directions for future research and implications for mitigating these potentially adverse effects on public health are discussed.