Dr Catherine Johnson receives seed award from the Wellcome Trust

Dr Catherine Johnson (Department of Culture, Film and Media, CLAS) is part of a team of researchers at the University of Nottingham that has received a seed award from the Wellcome Trust to look at the relationship between the televising of childbirth and women’s experiences of labour and birth. Programmes such as One Born Every Minute arguably play an important role in providing information about birth. While midwives have expressed concern that the televising of childbirth increases fear of birth amongst women, media scholars have struggled to find a direct link between media representations and women’s lived experiences. Meanwhile, the perspectives of programme-makers have been largely absent. This project brings together an interdisciplinary team managed by Dr Julie Roberts (School of Health Sciences), and including Dr Catherine Johnson, Professor Helen Spiby (Division of Midwifery) and Professor Paul Crawford (School of Health Sciences), to explore how televising childbirth shapes women’s perceptions of risk and structures the choices that they make. The project will include seminar series with academics from media and cultural studies and health sciences, analysis of One Born Every Minute, including its use of the internet and social media, engagement with national and local consumer groups and programme-makers, as well as focus groups with midwives and women.