Risk, morality and emotion: social media responses to pregnant women who smoke

Abstract

In this article, we use qualitative data to examine the shape and nature of the online ‘moral outrage’ that was directed at a research trial that used financial incentives to encourage pregnant mothers to quit smoking. Mai Frandsen developed the research trial in Tasmania, a small island state in Australia characterised by high rates of smoking in pregnancy. In this article, we draw on data from 121 online text comments posted in relation to three Australia-wide media stories relating to the research trial in 2015. Two of the online stories came from popular Australian independent ‘mummy’ website ‘Mamamia’. We found that the intense negative moral judgement directed at the programme and the women it benefited was driven by an individualised risk discourse drawing on ideologies of the ‘good’ and ‘intensive’ mother. We argue in this article that the over-emphasis on risk in relation to pregnancy produces a conservative morality that demonise women, fails to account for the social determinants of health and diminishes care for the Other. We argue that the research programme with its incentive component was a useful alternative to more punitive risk approaches as it promoted reward rather than blame and shame and acknowledged the importance of including emotions and morality in analysing the relationship between risk, health and society.

Keywords:

• neoliberalism
• risk
• intensive mothering
• pregnancy
• smoking
• social media
• incentives

Acknowledgements

We wish to acknowledge the assistance of Dr Megan Thow in preparing this manuscript. The research this work was based on was funded by a joint University of Tasmania and Cancer Council Tasmania postdoctoral research fellowship awarded to Mai Frandsen. The vouchers used in the original study were funded solely by the University of Tasmania.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the co-funded postdoctoral research fellowship from the University of Tasmania and Cancer Council Tasmania.