ABSTRACT
This chapter has arisen from my research into mainstream newspaper reports on herbal medicine in Australia. The objectives were to determine the dominant topics and frames that occurred in media reports about herbal medicine over a five-year period, and to measure the prevalence of risk references in newspaper reports during this timeframe. Sociological investigations into media representations of herbal medicine (and CAM, more broadly) are not common. My research attempts to address a gap in the research, using an interdisciplinary approach that draws from sociological theories of health, medicine and CAM, as well as media and risk. The research systematically measures the frequency of various themes and framings, using content analysis.
