Source: Compiled by author.

The second most popular theme in terms of number of articles in lavanguardia.com (19.6%) relates to the properties of certain foods: “Peppers: purifying, antioxidant and highly nutritious (11/07/2017). This stands in third place in elpais.com (9.9%): “Why white rice is more fattening than wholemeal although they have almost the same calories” (23/08/2017)

Obesity also plays a starring role in both newspapers (it is the fifth topic in elpais.com and the seventh in lavanguardia.com). This is an issue that has been arousing media interest for a while now, as demonstrated by a range of studies such as by Atasanova et al. (2012), Couch et al. (2015), Heuer et al. (2011), Jeong et al. (2014), De Brún et al. (2013) or Sun et al. (2016), to name just a few. Child nutrition is another popular content topic in both newspapers (7.4% in elpais.com and 5.4% in lavanguardia.com): “Which is the best milk for my child?” (elpais.com, 11/09/2017), “How to measure portions for your kids” (lavanguardia.com, 21/11/2017).

The remaining themes addressed by both newspapers include articles in lavanguardia.com on vegetarian food: “6 treats that you’d never have thought are vegan” (05/01/2017), “You CAN build muscle on a vegan diet” (19/03/2017).

Although there might generally seem to be similarities among the themes chosen by the two newspapers in broad terms, differences can be found in the value given to them, selection of specific topics and the times chosen to publish them. March happens to be a month when the two newspapers coincided on two of the selected contents: The controversial debate during a programme entitled Chester in love, produced by the Cuatro TV station, between the journalist Mercedes Milá and the biochemist José Miguel Mulet regarding the book entitled La enzima prodigiosa (The Enzyme Factor) (elpais.com, 09/03/2017; lavanguardia.com, 07/03/2017) and the new food pyramid proposal (elpais, 30/03/2017; lavanguardia, 03/03/2017), although in the case of the newspaper edited in Madrid, this merely entails a letter to the editor.

On 09/04/2017 elpais.com, quoting the University of Harvard, warned us that “the ‘gluten free’ fashion is increasing the risk of diabetes”. Almost a month later, 04/05/2017 lavanguardia.com alluded to the same academic institution to state that “Eating gluten-free can damage the cardiovascular health of non-coeliacs”. On 05/10/2017 elpais.com demonstrated “one trick to eat vegetables every day almost without noticing”, and three days later lavanguardia.com explained “how to eat and enjoy a variety of vegetables.”

4.2. Authorship

Authorship analysis for texts on Nutrition offers a very different snapshot for elpais.com and lavanguardia.com. In the former, 88.3% of articles are signed by journalists or newspaper contributors. Out of the 121 items published, only 9 (7.4%)