Social changes in family building: British media constructions of cross border surrogacy

Abstract

Background: Media framing can influence people’s perceptions of social changes in family building, and has the potential to influence their future actions. Objectives: to analyze the type of framing and construction used in news print articles of international surrogacy arrangements. Methods: UK newspaper media were searched using the search engine Lexis-Nexis for articles on international surrogacy. Content analysis was undertaken to identify use of gain/loss, alarm and vulnerability frames, as well as type of construction. Four researchers independently analyzed articles using a coding strategy specifically developed for this study. Results: 57 articles were analyzed. Differences in constructions between serious (mainly legal, financial), middle market (legal, social) and tabloid (social, commercialisation) newspapers were found. The middle market was more likely to cover stories concerning gay than heterosexual families, and all newspapers portrayed surrogacy negatively using loss frames for surrogates and gain frames for commissioning parent(s). Conclusions: Social changes in family formation did not always follow legal changes and framing of legal and commercial problems was prevalent. The welfare of children and surrogacy for medical reasons were minimally addressed.