The Matter of Journalists' Social Psychological Processes in a Divided and Conflicted Society

Abstract

In a conflicted and divided society, the role of journalists is crucial to presenting the possibility of a peaceful solution through their stories. Hence, in such societies, it is vital to investigate journalists’ social psychological processes including frequency of contact, positive and negative feelings, or perception of shared group identity. The current research was carried out with Turkish Cypriot and Greek Cypriot journalists who work in Cyprus Island, one of the last divided countries in modern Europe that displays features of an intractable conflict. The findings highlighted that journalists don’t have frequent intergroup contact with each other and community members, which has a positive correlation with outgroup attitudes, common ingroup identity, and forgiveness level, whereas negative correlation with intergroup anxiety. It has been revealed that intergroup contact, which improves positive feelings, is very important between journalists, especially those who work in a conflicted and divided society.