ArticleSocial sciences & humanities open2020
Pandemics, epidemics, viruses, plagues, and disease: Comparative frequency analysis of a cultural pathology reflected in science fiction magazines from 1926 to 2015.
Article in Social sciences & humanities open, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
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Who cites it
3 citing papers in PubMed, 10 citations in OpenAlex.
- Can science fiction engagement predict identification with all humanity? Testing a moderated mediation model.Frontiers in psychology · 2022Article
- Science fiction has become reality: Best practice for future viral pandemics.British journal of clinical pharmacology · 2021Article
- The Role of Social Media in the Advent of COVID-19 Pandemic: Crisis Management, Mental Health Challenges and Implications.Risk management and healthcare policy · 2021Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
1 author at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Science fiction includes many dystopian narratives, often featuring epidemics, pandemics, plagues, viruses, and disease. As science fiction has grown in popularity and prevalence it appeals to an increasingly broad demographic, is employed in research communication and education, and as a genre it is frequently argued that it reflects contemporary cultural interests and concerns. To identify the relevance of science fiction as an indicator of popular trends relating to the pathologies of disease, a word frequency comparison of selected key words found in the Google Books 2012 English Corpus has been made to a representative corpus of science fiction magazines dating between 1926 and 2015. Selected issues were reviewed to identify concepts, situations, and outcomes that could readily be measured against real-world examples from current and recent pandemics. The findings indicate that science fiction does appear to mirror and magnify contemporary literary trends, and provides potentially revealing correlations to real-world historical events. In this regard, science fiction might be regarded as a form of 'cultural pathology' of popular interests related to the spread and impact of disease that may be valuable in gauging the degree to which society is engaged with these topics at any specific time.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.