The Changing Misrepresentation of Race and Crime on Network and Cable News (original) (raw)
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Research on racial-ethnic portrayals in television crime news is limited and questions remain about the sources of representations and how these vary for perpetrators versus victims. We draw from power structure, market share, normal crimes, racial threat, and racial privileging perspectives to further this research. The reported race or ethnicity of violent crime perpetrators and victims are modeled as functions of: (1) situational characteristics of crime stories and (2) contextual characteristics of television market areas. The primary data are from a stratified random sample of television newscasts in 2002–2003 (Long et al. 2005). An important innovation of our work is the use of a national, more generalizeable, sample of local news stories than prior researchers who tended to focus on single market areas. Results indicate that both the context of the story itself and the social structural context within which news stories are reported are relevant to ethnic and racial portrayals in crime news. We find limited support for power structure, market share, normal crimes, and racial threat explanations of patterns of reporting. Racial privileging arguments receive more extensive support.
Viewer Ethnicity Matters: Black Crime in TV News and Its Impact on Decisions Regarding Public Policy
Journal of Social Issues, 2015
Content analyses have consistently documented the disproportionate portrayal of Black Americans as criminals in the news. This experiment examines the impact of such portrayals on consumers by investigating the relationship between viewer ethnicity, viewing Black criminal suspects in the news, and beliefs related to public policy. Participants viewed a 30-minute local newscast containing crime stories featuring a majority of Black suspects, White suspects, or no crime stories. Those exposed to crime stories featuring a majority of Black suspects were more likely to rate a nondescript inmate as personally culpable (i.e., unable to be rehabilitated). An interaction between participant ethnicity and treatment condition revealed that ethnic minority group members who view a majority of Black criminals demonstrated significantly lower police support than other participants. These data suggest a complex relationship between exposure to Black crime, racial/ethnic-group membership, and crime-related perceptions and have implications for priming and spreading activation.
Racialized portrayals of reporters and criminals on local television news
2004
The author presents the results of a content analysis of TV newscasts, to test whether Blacks, Latinos, or Whites are systematically presented in a positive (news reporter or anchor) or negative (criminal) light. When I was a young man, I watched a news program with my family. At some point during the newscast there was a story about a horrible crime. I can't remember today what the report was about, but I do remember it involved murder and the police didn't have any suspects in custody. After the murder was described, I recall my mother saying "I sure hope whoever did that wasn't Black." It was interesting because I was thinking the same thing, though I hadn't verbalized it. Similar scenarios were repeated several times during my childhood and adolescence. If the reporters revealed that the suspect was not Black then there was a sense of relief in the room. If, on the other hand, the reporters indicated the suspect was Black, there was a slight feeling of despair, shame, and fear-though no one in the room had ever ommitted a crime. c When my friends from the African American community ask me what I do for a living, I tell them I am a professor who studies race and the news. To illustrate what that means, I often ask my friends if they've ever been in a similar scenario to the one I described above. Invariably, they say yes. I believe that the reason for this reaction to news programming by Blacks is twofold. First, there is the feeling that the news often misrepresents Blacks as criminals. Second, there is the concern that this misrepresentation promotes stereotyping of Mrican Americans as lawbreakers, which leads to discrimination, prejudice, and racism. Part of that stereotype is the notion that Blacks are responsible for most crimes that occur and that crime is a rampant problem is society.
Journal of Communication, 2000
We conducted a content analysis of a random sample of local television news programming in Los Angeles and Orange counties to assess representations of Blacks, Latinos, and Whites as lawbreakers and law defenders. "Intergroup" comparisons of perpetrators (Black and Latino vs. White) revealed that Blacks and Latinos are significantly more likely than Whites to be portrayed as lawbreakers on television news. "Interrole" comparisons (lawbreakers vs. law defenders) revealed that Blacks and Latinos are more likely to be portrayed as lawbreakers than as defenders, whereas Whites are significantly more likely to be portrayed as defenders than as lawbreakers. "Interreality" comparisons of lawbreakers (television news vs. crime reports from the California Department of Justice) revealed that Blacks are overrepresented as lawbreakers, and Latinos and Whites are underrepresented as lawbreakers on television news compared to their respective crime rates obtained from the California Department of Justice for Los Angeles and Orange counties. Interreality comparisons of law defenders (television news vs. county employment records) revealed that Whites are overrepresented, Latinos are underrepresented, and Blacks are neither over-nor underrepresented as police officers on television news compared to employment reports. We speculate on the psychological effects of exposure to these intergroup, interrole, and interreality differentials on television news viewers.
YOUNG, BLACK, AND GUILTY 1 YOUNG, GUILTY, AND BLACK: Racial bias in criminal news
Media coverage of crime tends to shape public opinion in various ways. Research tells us that, for example, the frequency with which the media represent alleged perpetrators and the victims has significant impact on the development of stereotypes and attitudes toward criminals and victims. For example, it is possible that the overrepresentation of certain groups (e.g., males, people of color, etc.) as perpetrators in news stories may encourage the development of racial and/or gender stereotypes or better yet encourage public anger toward such groups (e.g., Barlow, Barlow, and Chiricos 1990; Dixon, Azocar and Casas 2003; Dixon and Linz 2000a, 2000b; Russell 1998). In light of their potential influence, a number of researchers have directed their investigations to focus on how racial and ethnic groups are portrayed in crime news stories. Despite the proliferation of studies, findings about the frequency of words used to describe alleged perpetrators in media representations of crime vis-á-vis race-ethnic groups are not as readily accessible or as straightforward. Research provides some evidence that racial minorities (especially, African Americans) are overrepresented in news stories focused on perpetrators of violent crime (e.g., Frisby, 2015; Dixon and Linz 2000a). What is the presence of people of color and how are they framed in news stories? Studies that center on the representation of minority groups in media and news coverage seems to focus primarily on media effects and the the consequences of exposure to crime stories, racial conflicts, and development or maintenance of stereotypes and bias toward members of minority groups. This research focus is completely understandable in view of academic and scholarly interests in: (1) reducing stereotyped coverage and increasing accuracy and fairness in news coverage (Gilliam et al. 1996; Heider 2000; Klein and Naccarato 2003; Rosenstiel, Gottlieb, and YOUNG, BLACK, AND GUILTY 2 Brady 2000); and (2) framing news stories that include minority groups in a broader more objective context to ensure improved understanding of social problems like poverty, homelessness, welfare and crime (Coleman and Thorson 2002; Dixon et al. 2003; Iyengar 1991; Rogers and Thorson 2001). To address the possibility of creating media content that either enhances stereotyping, it was determined that research attention must be given to the words and adjectives used to describe alleged perpetrators and news portrayals by ethnicity and race. Answers are needed to a variety of questions. How are perpetrators (i.e., mass shooters) portrayed in news? Do media distinguish among ethnicity of the shooter and the words chosen in the story? Are race and ethnic representations equally distorted or accurate for violent crime?
Race and Local Television News Crime Coverage
Simile: Studies in Media & Information Literacy Education, 2003
Viewers of local television newscasts across the United States are regularly exposed to crime news stories. Crime coverage by local television stations is studied with an interest in how live reporting, dramatic video, and timeliness influence perceptions of race in the United States. Crime coverage did not always identify the race of a suspect because that information often was not available from police. However, when violent criminals or suspects were identified, race normally was shown through a mug shot, photograph, or video from the scene. When an African-American suspect was shown in police custody, the images tended to reinforce existing racial stereotypes about African-Americans as dangerous criminals.
Politics, Groups, and Identities, 2018
News framing choices remain critical components in the formation of political attitudes and public opinion. Early findings, which indicated that episodic framing of national issues like poverty and unemployment informed public opinion about minority group members, asserted that these framing choices often resulted in the attribution of societal ills to individuals rather than society atlarge. Moving this analytical framework into the twenty-first century, I engage with literature on racial messaging to show that shifting social norms surrounding implicit versus explicit racism have transformed the ways that news frames function in mass media. As such, this essay examines the canonical theory of news frames as falling along a thematic-episodic continuum. Fundamentally, I argue that implicit and explicit racial messaging in news media coverage of crime could change the way viewers form opinions of Black Americans and criminality. Thus, it is critical to revisit longstanding theories of news frames to accommodate the present political moment.