Sensationalism

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Causes of death in the US vs media coverage. The percentage of media attention for terrorism, homicide or suicide is much greater than the percentage of deaths caused by it. There is a null in numerical data concerning deaths per day on various bars in media charts. Causes-of-death-in-USA-vs.-media-coverage.png
Causes of death in the US vs media coverage. The percentage of media attention for terrorism, homicide or suicide is much greater than the percentage of deaths caused by it. There is a null in numerical data concerning deaths per day on various bars in media charts.

In journalism and mass media, sensationalism is a type of editorial tactic. Events and topics in news stories are selected and worded to excite the greatest number of readers and viewers. This style of news reporting encourages biased or emotionally loaded impressions of events rather than neutrality, and may cause a manipulation to the truth of a story. [1] [ better source needed ] Sensationalism may rely on reports about generally insignificant matters and portray them as a major influence on society, or biased presentations of newsworthy topics, in a trivial, or tabloid manner, contrary to general assumptions of professional journalistic standards. [2] [3]

Contents

Some tactics include being deliberately obtuse, [4] appealing to emotions, [5] [ better source needed ] being controversial, intentionally omitting facts and information, [6] [ better source needed ] being loud and self-centered, and acting to obtain attention. [5] [ better source needed ] Trivial information and events are sometimes misrepresented and exaggerated as important or significant, and often include stories about the actions of individuals and small groups of people, [1] [ better source needed ] the content of which is often insignificant and irrelevant to the macro-level day-to-day events occurring globally.

History

In A History of News, Mitchell Stephens notes sensationalism can be found in the Ancient Roman gazette Acta Diurna , where official notices and announcements were presented daily on public message boards, the perceived content of which spread with enthusiasm in illiterate societies. [2] Sensationalism was used in books of the 16th and 17th century, to teach moral lessons. According to Stephens, sensationalism brought the news to a new audience when it became aimed at the lower class, who had less of a need to accurately understand politics and the economy, to occupy them in other matters. Through sensationalism, he claims, the audience was further educated and encouraged to take more interest in the news. [2]

The more modern forms of sensationalism developed in the course of the nineteenth century in parallel with the expansion of print culture in industrialized nations. A genre of British literature, "sensation novels," became in the 1860s an example of how the publishing industry could capitalize on surprising narrative to market serialized fiction in periodicals.[ citation needed ] The attention-grasping rhetorical techniques found in sensation fiction were also employed in articles on science, modern technology, finance, and in historical accounts of contemporary events. [7] Sensationalism in nineteenth century could be found in popular culture, literature, performance, art history, theory, pre-cinema, and early cinema. [8]

In the Soviet Union, strong censorship resulted in only "positive occurrences" being reported on, with the news looking significantly different than in the West. [9] [ additional citation(s) needed ]

In the United States, modern sensationalism in the news increased after the repeal of the Fairness Doctrine in 1987 by the Federal Communications Commission which required broadcasters when showing one partisan view to show another [10] [ page needed ] and in order to be a broadcaster one needed a license. [11] In Western Europe sensationalism in the news also increased after the liberalization of television networks in the late 1980s and early 1990s. [12]

Underlying causes

The role of profit

American cartoon published in 1898, Remember the Maine! And Don't Forget the Starving Cubans! Such sensationalist cartoons were used to support American intervention in the Cuban War of Independence. Remember the Maine! And Don't Forget the Starving Cubans! - Victor Gillam (cropped).jpg
American cartoon published in 1898, Remember the Maine! And Don't Forget the Starving Cubans! Such sensationalist cartoons were used to support American intervention in the Cuban War of Independence.

In the late 1800s, falling costs in paper production and rising revenues in advertising in the U.S. led to a drastic rise in newspaper's circulation, [13] which attracted the growing audiences that advertisers desired. One presumed goal of sensational reporting is to increase or sustain viewership or readership, from which media outlets can price their advertising higher to increase their profits based on higher numbers of viewers and/or readers. [14] [15] [ better source needed ] Sometimes this can lead to a lesser focus on objective journalism in favor of a profit motive, [16] in which editorial choices are based upon sensational stories and presentations to increase advertising revenue. [16] Additionally, advertisers tend to have a preference for their products or services to be reported positively in mass media, which can contribute to bias in news reporting in favor of media outlets protecting their profits and revenues, rather than reporting objectively about stated products and services. [15] [17] [ better source needed ] The more dependent news organizations are on advertising revenue a greater number of sensationalist news stories are produced is argued by Paul Hendriks Vettehen and Mariska Kleemans in Proving the Obvious? What Sensationalism Contributes to the Time Spent on News Video. [18]

The Watergate scandal has been credited by some with creating distrust in government and opening the door for a new business tactic for the media that resulted in the spread of negative, dishonest and misleading news coverage of American politics; [16] [19] such examples include the labeling of a large number of political scandals, regardless of their importance, with the suffix "-gate". [19]

Sensationalism has also been blamed for the infotainment style of many news programs on radio and television. [2] According to sociologist John Thompson, the debate of sensationalism used in the mass medium of broadcasting is based on a misunderstanding of its audience, especially the television audience. Thompson explains that the term 'mass' (which is connected to broadcasting) suggests a 'vast audience of many thousands, even millions of passive individuals'. [3] Television news is restricted to showing the scenes of crimes rather than the crime itself because of the unpredictability of events, whereas newspaper writers can always recall what they did not witness. [2] [ verification needed ]

On web-based platforms such as Facebook, Google and YouTube their respective algorithms are used to maximize advertising revenue by attracting and keeping the attention of users. This business model results in sensationalist content often being prioritized as algorithms often predict that it will get the highest amount of engagement. [20]

Politics

The relationship of sensationalism to politics is not new. [21] CBS News in 2020 described Trump as using fear, anxiety and anger to try and motivate voters. [22]

Novelty and unusualness

When trying to cater to younger audiences, news stories that are more sensational and unusual will often drown out stories that may be considered less exciting but more significant. In Mass Media and American Politics, Doris A. Graber and Johanna Dunaway give the example of how the Chicago Sun Times will give 20 times more space to sports in comparison to the state government. Covering singular news stories that are considered dramatic can lead to other stories being obscured. [23] [ page needed ]

Time constraints

In a 24-hour news cycle, there will be instances where there is little news happening along with no developments in stories that are considered important and because of this they will need to fill the time by sharing a story that is less so about actual news and more intended to keep the audience's attention. [24]

Competition

In news markets where there is more competition the more likely a certain news outlet will be to produce sensationalist stories as a way to compete with other outlets. [25]

Features of sensationalism

Language

One feature of sensationalistic news is the intensification of language used in the article. [26] Language that is sensationalist often is dramatic although vague yet hyperbolic usually at the expense of giving a distortion of reality. [27] The most common use of sensationalist language is in the headlines of news articles. [21]

"Slam Journalism" is a term describing the rise of intense, emotionally charged language in headlines, notably the use of the word slam to mean criticize. [28] [ better source needed ] The data scientist Cory Booker suggests that news agencies simply "[speak] the language that resonates with their audience best." [28] [ better source needed ]

Below are examples of such headlines, with the intense language highlighted in bold. [28] [ better source needed ]

The teaser

David Berube considers the use of headlines to be the primary way sensationalism manifests in media, by creating teasers that use emotion to try and capture the attention of an audience even if the headline exaggerates or is otherwise misleading. [21] In YouTube videos, the thumbnail image of a video can similarly mislead audiences. [29]

Fearmongering

The use of fearmongering is sometimes used by media outlets as well to gain attention to their content. [21]

Impacts of sensationalism

Zeynep Tufecki argues that it's easier to shift the "Overton window" online thanks to algorithms replacing traditional gatekeepers of journalism. [30]

C.P. Chandrasekhar argues that news outlets are at a higher risk of releasing content that is false because of how quickly news is circulated through the internet in order to capitalize on those views and clicks for profit. [31] [ verification needed ][ better source needed ]

Joe Sommerlad criticized algorithms used by Google News for not promoting more trustworthy sources. [32]

Distortion of events

Overrepresentation of crime

One of the most prominent and most covered news topics is crime being represented disproportionately to other social problems. [33] Most often what is covered is the "accounts of the commission of crime and law-enforcement activities." A lesser amount but still significant level is given to court proceedings and the least related to corrections giving the public a limited understand of the criminal justice system and the social contexts of crime. [34]

Exaggeration of science news

With science news, the press release may be relied upon heavily, which can exaggerate or spin the findings. One theory for this practice, in addition to time constraints, is that journalists do not access academic articles as much since many are behind paywalls. [35] One example of sensationalism in science news was in 1998 when Andrew Wakefield published a study in The Lancet showing a link between MMR vaccines and autism [35] with it reaching the news media via press releases and a news conference [36] getting widespread coverage despite the publication being flawed and the article later being debunked and retracted. [35]

Responses to sensationalism

Fact-checking websites, media literacy, better content moderation on social media, and legislation have been pursued to reduce the negative impacts of algorithms and sensational media. [37]

When American public television news came about in the mid-20th century it came about in part in response to the commercial news stations having sensationalized news prioritized above that of "serious reporting". [38]

See also

Related Research Articles

Journalism is the production and distribution of reports on the interaction of events, facts, ideas, and people that are the "news of the day" and that informs society to at least some degree of accuracy. The word, a noun, applies to the occupation, the methods of gathering information, and the organizing literary styles.

Media bias occurs when journalists and news producers show bias in how they report and cover news. The term "media bias" implies a pervasive or widespread bias contravening of the standards of journalism, rather than the perspective of an individual journalist or article. The direction and degree of media bias in various countries is widely disputed.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tabloid (newspaper format)</span> Type of newspaper

A tabloid is a newspaper with a compact page size smaller than broadsheet. There is no standard size for this newspaper format.

In journalism, yellow journalism and the yellow press are American newspapers that use eye-catching headlines and sensationalized exaggerations for increased sales. The English term is chiefly used in the US. In the United Kingdom, a similar term is tabloid journalism. Other languages, e.g. Russian, sometimes have terms derived from the American term. Yellow journalism emerged in the intense battle for readers by two newspapers in New York City in 1890s. It was not common in other cities.

Junk food news is a sardonic term for news stories that deliver "sensationalized, personalized, and homogenized inconsequential trivia", especially when such stories appear at the expense of serious investigative journalism. It implies a criticism of the mass media for disseminating news that, while not very nourishing, is "cheap to produce and profitable for media proprietors."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Media manipulation</span> Techniques in which partisans create an image that favours their interests

Media manipulation refers to orchestrated campaigns in which actors exploit the distinctive features of broadcasting mass communications or digital media platforms to mislead, misinform, or create a narrative that advance their interests and agendas.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">News media</span> Elements of mass media that focus on delivering news

The news media or news industry are forms of mass media that focus on delivering news to the general public. These include news agencies, newspapers, news magazines, news channels etc.

Infotainment, also called soft news as a way to distinguish it from serious journalism or hard news, is a type of media, usually television or online, that provides a combination of information and entertainment. The term may be used disparagingly to devalue infotainment or soft news subjects in favor of more serious hard news subjects. Infotainment-based websites and social media apps gained traction due to their focused publishing of infotainment content, e.g. BuzzFeed.

Penny press newspapers were cheap, tabloid-style newspapers mass-produced in the United States from the 1830s onwards. Mass production of inexpensive newspapers became possible following the shift from hand-crafted to steam-powered printing. Famous for costing one cent while other newspapers cost around six cents, penny press papers were revolutionary in making the news accessible to middle class citizens for a reasonable price.

Advocacy journalism is a genre of journalism that adopts a non-objective viewpoint, usually for some social or political purpose.

Journalistic ethics and standards comprise principles of ethics and good practice applicable to journalists. This subset of media ethics is known as journalism's professional "code of ethics" and the "canons of journalism". The basic codes and canons commonly appear in statements by professional journalism associations and individual print, broadcast, and online news organizations.

Mass communication is the process of imparting and exchanging information through mass media to large population segments. It utilizes various forms of media as technology has made the dissemination of information more efficient. Primary examples of platforms utilized and examined include journalism and advertising. Mass communication, unlike interpersonal communication and organizational communication, focuses on particular resources transmitting information to numerous receivers. The study of mass communication is chiefly concerned with how the content and information that is being mass communicated persuades or affects the behavior, attitude, opinion, or emotion of people receiving the information.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Broadcast journalism</span> Field of news and journals which are broadcast

Broadcast journalism is the field of news and journals which are broadcast by electronic methods instead of the older methods, such as printed newspapers and posters. It works on radio, television and the World Wide Web. Such media disperse pictures, visual text and sounds.

Tabloid television, also known as teletabloid, is a form of tabloid journalism. Tabloid television news broadcasting usually incorporate flashy graphics and sensationalized stories. Often, there is a heavy emphasis on crime and celebrity news.

Claims of media bias generally focus on the idea of media outlets reporting news in a way that seems partisan. Other claims argue that outlets sometimes sacrifice objectivity in pursuit of growth or profits.

Media Relations involves working with media for the purpose of informing the public of an organization's mission, policies and practices in a positive, consistent and credible manner. It can also entail developing symbiotic relationships with media outlets, journalists, bloggers, and influencers to garner publicity for an organization. Typically, this means coordinating directly with the people responsible for producing the news and features in the mass media. The goal of media relations is to maximize positive coverage in the mass media without paying for it directly through advertising.

State media are typically understood as media outlets that are owned, operated, or significantly influenced by the government. They are distinguished from public service media, which are designed to serve the public interest, operate independently of government control, and are financed through a combination of public funding, licensing fees, and sometimes advertising. The crucial difference lies in the level of independence from government influence and the commitment to serving a broad public interest rather than the interests of a specific political party or government agenda.

The term "journalism genres" refers to various journalism styles, fields or separate genres, in writing accounts of events.

The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to journalism:

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nota roja</span>

Nota roja is a journalism genre popular in Mexico. While similar to more general sensationalist or yellow journalism, the nota roja focuses almost exclusively on stories related to physical violence related to crime, accidents and natural disasters. The origin of the name is most likely related to the Mexican Inquisition, where a red stamp was placed on orders for execution or other punishments. By the 19th century, the term came to be used for violent crime, especially murder. With the development of the newspaper industry in that century, news of this type developed long, very detailed stories, which might have a graphic image to artistically depict the event. Both were meant to provoke emotion and sensationalism. The need to provoke emotion in the stories continued into the 20th century, but the introduction of photography in journalism changed both the illustration and text of the stories, with photographs, especially gory ones, dominating nota roja pages and text diminishing to bare facts and violent words. Today, entire newspapers are devoted to nota roja stories and have infiltrated television as well. The genre has also influenced writing and cinema in Mexico as well as prompted criticisms that it promotes and commercializes violence.

References

  1. 1 2 "Issue Area: Sensationalism". Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting . Archived from the original on 5 February 2012. Retrieved 21 June 2011.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 Stephens, Mitchell (2007). A History of News (3 ed.). New York: Oxford University Press. pp. 55–57. ISBN   978-0-19-518991-9.
  3. 1 2 Thompson, John (June 22, 1999). "The Media and Modernity". In Mackay, Hugh; O'Sullivan, Tim (eds.). The Media Reader: Continuity and Transformation. Sage Publications Ltd. ISBN   978-0-7619-6250-2.
  4. ↑ "Sensationalism." Webster's Dictionary. Accessed June 2011.
  5. 1 2 "Sensationalism." The Free Dictionary. Accessed June 2011.
  6. ↑ "Issue Area: Narrow Range of Debate." Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting. Accessed June 2011.
  7. ↑ Alberto Gabriele, Reading Popular Culture in Victorian Print: Belgravia and Sensationalism, New York and London, Palgrave Macmillan, 2009 ISBN   978-0-230-61521-2
  8. ↑ Alberto Gabriele, ed. Sensationalism and the Genealogy of Modernity: a Global Nineteenth Century Perspective. Palgrave Macmillan, 2016 ISBN   978-1-137-60128-5
  9. ↑ Nordenstreng, Kaarle; Björk, Ulf Jonas; Beyersdorf, Frank; Høyer, Svennik; Lauk, Epp (2015). A History of the International Movement of Journalists: Professionalism Versus Politics. Palgrave Macmillan. p. 28. ISBN   9781137530554 . Retrieved April 19, 2024– via Google Books. no dramatic or sensationalism news: no accidents, no murder, adulteries or corruptions
  10. ↑ Brooks, Brian S.; Pinson, James L. (2022). "Journalisms Credibility Problems". The Art of Editing: In the Age of Convergence (Ebook) (12th ed.). Taylor & Francis. ISBN   978-1-000-52998-2 – via Google Books. Today, we're living through a second Party Press Era combined with a second Yellow Journalism Era-blatant partisanship combined with sensationalism. This is probably most evident in the coverage of cable television's 24-hour news channels. It started with the 1987 repeal by President Ronald Reagan's Federal Communications Commission of the 1949 so-called "Fairness Doctrine" which had required broadcasters to counter any partisan view with the opposite side
  11. ↑ Ruane, Kathleen Ann (July 13, 2011). Fairness Doctrine: History and Constitutional Issues (PDF). Washington, D.C.: Congressional Research Service. Retrieved April 19, 2024.
  12. ↑ Arbaoui, Bouchra; Swert, Knut De; Brug, Wouter van der (2020). "Sensationalism in news coverage: A comparative study in 14 television systems" (PDF). Communication Research. 47 (2). University of Amsterdam: 299–300. doi:10.1177/0093650216663364 . Retrieved March 18, 2024– via UvA-DARE (Digital Academic Repository). The liberalization of West European television systems in the late 1980s and early 1990s is often linked to an increase of infotainment and sensationalism in television news coverage
  13. ↑ Kaplan, Richard L. (2008-06-05), "Yellow Journalism" , The International Encyclopedia of Communication, Chichester, UK: John Wiley & Sons, Ltd, doi:10.1002/9781405186407.wbiecy001, ISBN   978-1-4051-8640-7 , retrieved 2021-03-31
  14. ↑ "What's Wrong With The News?" Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting. Accessed June 2011.
  15. 1 2 "Issue Area: Advertiser Influence." Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting. Accessed June 2011.
  16. 1 2 3 McChesney, Fred S. (1987). "Sensationalism, Newspaper Profits and the Marginal Value of Watergate". Economic Inquiry . 25 (1): 135–44. doi:10.1111/j.1465-7295.1987.tb00728.x.
  17. ↑ "Issue Area: Censorship." Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting. Accessed June 2011.
  18. ↑ Vettehen, Paul Hendriks; Kleemans, Mariska (2017). "Proving the Obvious? What Sensationalism Contributes to the Time Spent on News Video". Electronic News. 12 (2): 114. doi: 10.1177/1931243117739947 . hdl: 2066/191971 . In addition, the more news organizations are dependent on advertising revenues (commercial vs. public service stations), the more sensationalist news stories they produce
  19. 1 2 Finney, Daniel P. (16 June 2012). "Watergate scandal changed the political landscape forever". USA Today. Archived from the original on 8 November 2019.
  20. ↑ Stone, Deborah (2020). Counting: How We Use Numbers to Decide What Matters. Liveright. ISBN   9781631495939 . Retrieved April 10, 2024– via Google Books.
  21. 1 2 3 4 Vanacore, Ryan (November 12, 2021). "Sensationalism in Media". Reporter Magazine .
  22. ↑ Watson, Kathryn (2020-09-29). "Trump banks on fear and anxiety to motivate voters - CBS News". www.cbsnews.com. Retrieved 2024-03-07.
  23. ↑ Graber, Doris A.; Dunaway, Johanna (2017). Mass Media and American Politics. SAGE Publications. ISBN   9781506340241 . Retrieved March 8, 2024– via Google Books. When the goal is to attract young viewers, sensational and novel occurrences often drown out news of more significant that lacks excitement. For instance, a fairly typical newspaper such as the Chicago Sun Times devotes nearly twenty times more space to sports than to news about the state's government. Dramatic events, such as airline hijackings or serial murders, preempt more far-reaching consequential happenings. Preoccupation with a single striking event, such as the 2009 impeachment of Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich, can shortchange coverage of other news
  24. ↑ Thiel, Kristin (2018). Television News and the 24-Hour News Cycle. Cavendish Square. p. 30. ISBN   9781502634931 – via Google Books.
  25. ↑ Vettehen, Paul Hendriks; Kleemans, Mariska (2017). "Proving the Obvious? What Sensationalism Contributes to the Time Spent on News Video". SageJournal. 12 (2): 114. doi: 10.1177/1931243117739947 . hdl: 2066/191971 .
  26. ↑ Burgers, Christian; de Graaf, Anneke (2013-01-29). "Language intensity as a sensationalistic news feature: The influence of style on sensationalism perceptions and effects" . Communications: The European Journal of Communication Research . 38 (2). doi:10.1515/commun-2013-0010. ISSN   1613-4087.
  27. ↑ "How to Spot 16 Types of Media Bias". AllSides. 26 August 2019. Retrieved March 9, 2024.
  28. 1 2 3 Foster, Corbin (October 4, 2019). "Blog: The Rise of "Slam" Journalism". Textio . Retrieved January 26, 2024.
  29. ↑ Banning, Stephen A. (2020). Journalism Standards of Work Today: Using History to Create a New Code of Journalism Ethics. Cambridge Scholars Publisher. p. 120. ISBN   9781527559028 . Retrieved April 10, 2024– via Google Books.
  30. ↑ Tufekci, Zeynep (2016-03-31). "Opinion | Adventures in the Trump Twittersphere". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved 2021-04-01.
  31. ↑ Chandrasekhar, C.P. (2013). "The Business of News in the Age of the Internet". Social Scientist . 41 (5/6): 25–39. ISSN   0970-0293. JSTOR   23611116.
  32. ↑ Sommerlad, Joe (2018-06-18). "This is how Google News decides what to show you". The Independent. Retrieved 2020-03-11.
  33. ↑ NEWS COVERAGE AND CRIME: A QUALITATIVE STUDY OF AGENTS INVOLVED IN NEWS PRODUCTION (PDF). University of North Carolina Wilmington. 2010. p. 1. One of the most prevalent subjects of media discourse is crime. Crime is represented in many different media categories from entertainment to news and intermediate forms such as infotainment. While entertainment media doubtlessly have a significant socializing effect, they generally do not claim to be a true representation of reality. However, news media do make this claim (Mason, 2006; Surette, 2003). Despite this, studies show that when it comes to crime, media representations do not accurately reflect reality (Surette, 2003).. Additionally, crime news is one of the most prominent categories in news media; it is covered disproportionately more than other social problems (Leishman & Mason, 2003; Gans, 2004).
  34. ↑ Chagnon, Nicholas J. (2010). NEWS COVERAGE AND CRIME: A QUALITATIVE STUDY OF AGENTS INVOLVED IN NEWS PRODUCTION (PDF). University of North Carolina Wilmington. p. 10. Retrieved March 10, 2024.
  35. 1 2 3 Dempster, Georgia; Sutherland, Georgina; Keogh, Louise (March 7, 2022). "Scientific research in news media: a case study of misrepresentation, sensationalism and harmful recommendations". Journal of Science Communication. 21 (1): A06. doi: 10.22323/2.21010206 .
  36. ↑ Moore, Andrew (December 2006). "Bad science in the headlines. Who takes responsibility when science is distorted in the mass media?". EMBO Reports. 7 (12): 1193–1196. doi:10.1038/sj.embor.7400862. PMC   1794697 . PMID   17139292.
  37. ↑ Vasu, Norman; Ang, Benjamin; Teo, Terri-Anne; Jayakumar, Shashi; Faizal, Muhammad; Ahuja, Juhi (2018). "International Responses to Fake News". Fake News: National Security in the Post-Truth Era. S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies. pp. 18–25. JSTOR   resrep17648.8.
  38. ↑ Sterling, Christopher H. (2009). Encyclopedia of Journalism. Vol. 6. SAGE Publications. p. 1155. ISBN   978-0-7619-2957-4 – via Google Books.
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