Basis for the informative treatment of drugs in mass media

Abstract

The social responsibility of the media extends to all matters it reports on, such us drug use, a widespread social phenomenon with a regular presence in the press. Therefore, this research tried, firstly, to describe the media representation of drugs and, secondly, to expose how drugs should be informatively treated in a responsible manner from a double deontological and preventive point of view. For this purpose, the scientific and informative literature on this topic was analyzed, finding that the informative treatment of drugs has been mostly criticized by those who have studied it in the last five decades. The media offers information that is sometimes sensationalist and usually not verified, since a single source, mostly institutional, tends to be used, which is easily accessible to the journalist. In addition, mass media have been accused of spreading stereotypes, an imprecise, if not mistaken, image of this phenomenon and even playing a counter- preventive role. Despite this, the important collaboration of journalists and the media has been highlighted, as these are the main source of information on drugs for the general population. The emergence of the Internet has added a new field of research on communication and drugs of multiple formats, channels and content, where the general population, youth, institutions and media professionals coexist.