JUSTIFICATION

Skin cancer is currently a growing global epidemic with a major impact on health services. It is the second most prevalent cause of mortality in industrialised countries and is spreading among the young population, making melanoma the most common cancer among adults under the age of thirty and the second most common cancer among adolescents and young adults. Most of the affected population may have been damaged by excessive UV exposure in their adolescence and early adulthood and research in several countries points to the university student population as an at-risk group.

The project results in the first international multidisciplinary study that jointly analyses the knowledge, attitudes and habits of the population and the strategic evaluation of communication campaigns on skin cancer photoprevention.

Project innovation

  • The project is an international pioneer in bringing together a multidisciplinary team from Communication Sciences and Health Sciences to approach the object of study, integrating researchers specialising in Dermatology, Oncology, Psychiatry, Strategic Communication, Media Discourse Analysis, Social Media Communication and Communication and Gender Perspectives.
  • It is the first scientific work that would produce specific results of prevention communication on skin cancer with a direct transfer of results to health entities, foundations and associations, which are the main actors of the associative social fabric in Spain.
  • It is the first project in Spain on strategic communication of photoprevention, focusing on the effectiveness of strategic communication of real communication campaigns for skin cancer prevention.
  • It is the first international work that would address discourses on photoprotection in social media, combining content analysis methodologies in the framework of agenda-setting with sentiment analysis in social media.
  • It is the first empirical work to focus specifically on the at-risk population identified in previous studies in Spain: young university students.
  • For the first time at the international level, it allows for the introduction of gender approaches (beyond the sampling division by gender) and their relation to the reception of solar photoprevention communication.

GOALS

GOAL 1

Organise and categorise multidisciplinary research on photoprotection communication for skin cancer prevention based on the multidisciplinarity and interdisciplinarity of the team.

GOAL 2

To analyse the study population's knowledge, attitudes and communication about tanning, skin cancer and sun protection.

GOAL 3

To analyse the strategic communication of solar photoprevention that is disseminated on social media in Spain.

GOAL 4

To find out the effectiveness of the strategic communication of photo-prevention campaigns disseminated in Spain on social media.

GOAL 5

Knowledge transfer to health institutions and associations, the main issuers of strategic photoprevention communication in Spain (ECPCPs).

Project PID2020-116487RB-100 financed by: