Generic Language in the Communication of Health Research

Generic claims imply universal rules about categories or groups by glossing over individual variability and exceptions. Consider, for example, the generic news headline ‘Exercise helps teens quit smoking’ relative to the non-generic ‘Exercise helps some teens quit smoking’. When generic language is used in primary reporting of scientific research (i.e., journal articles) the reported claims are perceived to be more important and more generalisable than when non-generic language is used. This study aimed to establish whether the same effects would be present within secondary reporting of research (i.e., news articles aimed at the public), with a particular focus on personal health claims. Participants read a series of genuine news headlines in either their original generic format (e.g., ‘Exercise helps teens...’) a past-tense non-generic format (e.g., ‘Exercise helped teens...’) or a qualified non-generic format (e.g., ‘Exercise helps some teens...’). Generic headlines were rated as slightly more important and more generalisable than headlines qualified with the word ‘some’. In contrast, we found no differences in perceived importance or generalisability between generic headlines and past-tense non-generic headlines. Our results suggest that writers must be explicitly non-universal when summarising research in order to accurately communicate constraints on generality.