Discourse analysis reveals China Daily frames autism as a challenge of social integration, indicating a shift in narrative focus.
News dissemination is pivotal in shaping public discourse on important health issues. This study examines the representation of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) in China’s official English-language newspaper, China Daily . Grounded in Framing Theory, we employ a topic-modeling-assisted discourse analysis on a corpus of 93 articles (409,400 tokens) from 1981 to 2023. The analysis reveals that China Daily strategically frames autism not as a medical deficit but as a challenge of social integration, addressed through narratives of familial dedication, professional intervention, and collective societal support. This constructive portrayal, which starkly contrasts with deficit-focused narratives common in Western media, performs key framing functions by defining problems socially, attributing causes to collective effort, and promoting solutions centered on education and inclusion. The study highlights the strategic role of state-affiliated media in shaping a hopeful public health discourse for a global audience and enriches Framing Theory by linking frame selection to cultural and institutional contexts.
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Liu et al. (2025) studied this question.
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