Manual Content Analysis of Media Coverage and User-Generated Content on the Digital Self-Management of Chronic Diseases – Codebook for Editorial Media Items

This codebook provides the coding framework for a manual content analysis of editorial media coverage of the digital self-management of chronic diseases in the German media landscape. The study aims to systematically examine how digital technologies for the self-management of diabetes, asthma, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) are portrayed in German editorial media. The codebook covers editorial media items from national and regional newspapers and their online editions, news magazines, special-interest and professional magazines, television programs, online news portals, and the Instagram accounts of selected editorial media outlets. The study period ranges from January 1, 2010 to June 30, 2025.

The coding framework addresses several key dimensions of media coverage, including the digital technologies discussed and their evaluation, the actors quoted, the presence of news factors, the framing of digital self-management, journalistic quality, and the representation of scientific evidence, including the handling of scientific uncertainty. The codebook serves as a methodological instrument for ensuring the systematic, transparent, and reproducible coding of editorial media coverage of digital self-management of chronic diseases in Germany.