ABSTRACT
This chapter outlines an analysis of selected news coverage to explore how the problem of human immunodeficiency virus/acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) AIDS is socially constructed through categorizations employed by the print media. It explores the implications that can be derived for text-based health education campaigns. The chapter suggest that people's reluctance to adopt safer sex practices is, in part, attributable to the divergence between the model of rationality assumed in media coverage and the everyday, or common-sense, rationality persons actually use in understanding and negotiating their sexual conduct. In sub-Saharan Africa, AIDS education programs are still largely based on behavior modification models and information dissemination strategies similar to those discussed in the context of media coverage. Taking everyday reasoning into account as an alternative set of premises for mediating the relations between knowledge and action would clearly involve a shift in social science research priorities.
