The effects of news stories that put crime and violence into context: testing the public health model of reporting.
The purpose of this study is to examine whether changing the way newspaper stories report crime and violence can induce shifts in readers' perceptions of the problem. Using an experiment that manipulates the framing and graphic presentation of newspaper stories on crime and violence, we seek to discover whether the public health model that calls for news stories to incorporate information on context, risk factors, and prevention strategies will help readers learn more about the context in which crime and violence occurs, endorse prevention strategies in addition to punishment, and become more attuned to societal risk factors and causes of crime and violence.
Coleman
Renita
R
Manship School of Mass Communication, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, Louisiana 70803-7202, USA. rcoleman@lsu.edu
Thorson
Esther
E
D003415:Crime / Q000517:prevention & control; D006801:Humans; D033181:Information Dissemination; D009524:Newspapers as Topic; D010565:Persuasive Communication; D011634:Public Health; D012307:Risk Factors; D040241:Social Marketing; D014481:United States / Q000453:epidemiology; D014754:Violence / Q000517:prevention & control