Women’s interpretation of anti-smoking messages in Indonesia: An audience analysis

Abstract

The study explores women’s narrative interpretation of existing anti-smoking messages and investigates their experiences within the smoking-related discourse that influences their meaning-making of the messages. Women’s experiences related to tobacco use are seldom acknowledged in the literature due to their seemingly insignificant low smoking practice compared to men’s smoking behaviour. The gender insensitivity perspective is problematic, because it overlooks the adverse effects of smoking for men and women. Anti-smoking public service announcements (PSAs) that aim to address the harms of tobacco use have not been assessed in gauging whether messages are meaningful for their target audience. This is the first study to explore women’s interpretation of anti-smoking messages in Indonesia, with a focus on women in low to middle socioeconomic groups, specifically in urban settings. This research addresses these issues and foreground the experiences of women through an interpretive-qualitative ethnographic approach. Nineteen smokers and 20 non-smokers aged >18 years old in Banda Aceh and Jakarta were interviewed individually and through focus group discussions (FGDs) with representatives from media, health and social-economic backgrounds. The findings revealed two unfavourable perspectives: (i) resistance; and (ii) denial of meanings addressed in anti-smoking PSAs. Negative interpretations were shaped by the context of media texts and women’s experiences with smoking-related practices. This study shows how these points of view challenge PSAs as ineffective and less influential in representing the generic reality of smokers and passive smokers in Indonesia.