'Half-cut' science : a qualitative examination of alcohol industry actors' use of peer-reviewed evidence in policy submissions on Minimum Unit Pricing

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Cullen, Dana and Smith, Katherine and Collin, Jeff (2019) 'Half-cut' science : a qualitative examination of alcohol industry actors' use of peer-reviewed evidence in policy submissions on Minimum Unit Pricing. Evidence and Policy, 15 (1). pp. 49-66. ISSN 1744-2648 (https://doi.org/10.1332/174426417X15071939491726)

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Abstract

Aim: To assess the extent to which alcohol industry actors cited evidence in submissions to the Scottish Parliament Health and Sport Committee’s 2011 call for written evidence on the Alcohol (Minimum Pricing) (Scotland) Bill and to compare any citations of peer-reviewed evidence to original sources. Methods: All submissions to the consultation (n=128) were manually searched to identify those written by alcohol industry actors (n=25). The reference lists of all the alcohol industry submissions were reviewed and peer-reviewed sources were retrieved, read and assessed against their in-text citation within the alcohol industry submissions. Results: Although most industry submissions cited evidence of some sort, only 7 (28%) cited peer-reviewed evidence. Comparing the total number of citations to peer-reviewed evidence (n=17) to original sources demonstrates that 82% were questionably cited. Conclusion: Our findings demonstrate that the majority of references to peer-reviewed evidence in this sample of alcohol industry policy submissions were misleading with examples of citations being presented as supportive of arguments that the original evidence source specifically argued against. This suggests that even the depiction of peer-reviewed evidence within alcohol industry policy submissions needs to be treated with caution.

ORCID iDs

Cullen, Dana, Smith, Katherine ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1060-4102 and Collin, Jeff;
  • Item type:Article
    ID code:70733
    Dates:
    Date
    Event
    31 January 2019
    Published
    10 October 2017
    Published Online
    20 September 2017
    Accepted
    Notes:This is a post-peer-review, pre-copy edited version of an article published in Evidence and Policy. The definitive publisher-authenticated version: Cullen, D., Smith, K., & Collin, J. (2019). 'Half-cut' science: a qualitative examination of alcohol industry actors' use of peer-reviewed evidence in policy submissions on Minimum Unit Pricing. Evidence and Policy, 15(1), 49-66. is available online here: https://doi.org/10.1332/174426417X15071939491726
    Subjects:Social Sciences
    Department:Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences (HaSS) > Social Work and Social Policy > Social Work and Social Policy > Social Work
    Depositing user: Pure Administrator
    Date deposited:06 Dec 2019 15:50
    Last modified:14 Nov 2024 01:13
    Related URLs:
    URI:https://strathprints.strath.ac.uk/id/eprint/70733
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