As the severe impacts of climate change become increasingly apparent, concerns about climate-related issues have grown in recent years. The news media plays an important role in disseminating information about climate change and its consequences to the wider public and thus can influence public climate concern. Here, we investigate how extreme weather affects issue attention to climate change in the European online news media and how extreme weather and news coverage jointly shape changes in climate change concern. For the analysis, we combine 12 harmonized Eurobarometer survey waves, measuring public concerns about climate issues, with meteorological data and indices of environmental news coverage based on publications from 2 481 media outlets in 200 regions of 22 European countries. Using fixed effects panel models, we estimate effects of temperature anomalies on climate news and climate concern and explore the role of the news media in explaining changes in concerns in response to temperature anomalies. The results indicate that unusually high temperatures exhibit a robust positive effect on media attention, especially when they overlap with other events that draw attention to the climate topic, such as major climate change conferences. We furthermore find evidence that the climate news in national outlets increases public concern about climate change and show that reporting by such outlets is likely to partly explain the effects of temperature anomalies on concerns. We do not find any significant effects of climate reporting in regional news outlets on climate concern. Our results suggest that the national news media partly mediates the effects of extreme weather on public climate change concern. The findings also highlight that focusing events strongly influence issue attention of the media, providing windows of opportunity to raise awareness about climate issues, while pointing to challenges in sustaining attention to related topics beyond short-lived news cycles.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, researchers and service providers were aware of the consequences of social conditions on interpersonal violence. Although news media were instrumental in bringing attention to interpersonal violence, there is a lack of research on the news media trajectory of attention to interpersonal violence following the pandemic. In this research, we analyzed 605 news media articles published between 2020 and 2023 related to the pandemic and interpersonal violence to assess the patterns of coverage. We found an evolution of the themes covered in news media articles, as well as the victims’ services and resources communicated through these articles.

ABSTRACT This article examines the celebritisation of Dr. Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar within Indian English-language digital news media between 2015 and 2025, focusing on how his public presence is constructed and negotiated across contemporary news coverage. Based on a qualitative textual analysis of 206 news articles and opinion pieces, it identifies three recurring modes: ritualised reverence in Ambedkar Jayanti reporting, coverage of statue desecration, and digital activism linked to anti-caste mobilisation and diaspora engagement. Drawing on communication, media, and celebrity studies, the article examines how visibility is sustained through repetition and participation in digital news environments. The findings demonstrate that Ambedkar’s public presence is extensive and widely recognisable, yet uneven in its articulation. Mainstream coverage often relies on commemorative and institutional narratives that produce recognition yet restrict sustained engagement with Ambedkar’s anti-caste thought. In contrast, digital platforms enable counter-public formations where his ideas are reinterpreted and mobilised across national and transnational contexts.

ABSTRACT While there is a broad societal call towards climate action, the extent to which climate journalists see a role for themselves as climate advocates remains unknown. This study explores how climate journalists perceive and enact the journalistic role of advocacy when reporting on climate solutions, through semi-structured interviews with 21 Dutch climate journalists. Our results show that Dutch climate journalists are hesitant about the advocacy role, in part suggesting that it may lead to biased journalism and could jeopardize their credibility. Instead, interviewees seemingly prefer the journalistic balance norm, whereby they offer audiences a contextualized portrayal of climate solutions that includes multiple actors and viewpoints. In this solution-centric context climate journalists revive the balance norm that was previously retired in climate journalism, albeit in a new light. We show how climate journalists hold a paradoxical relationship with objectivity: although climate journalists largely agree that absolute objectivity does not exist, they still feel it is desirable to strive after. Overall, our results feed into debates about trust in legacy news media and the increasing need for climate action.

ABSTRACT Environmental journalism plays a vital role in public discourse but faces challenges in engaging audiences within a fragmented digital media landscape dominated by Big Tech companies. This study explores how data-driven storytelling, personalized news delivery, and community-centered narratives influence audience engagement and trust in environmental journalism, with a specific focus on the Amazon region. Through a series of focus groups with local audiences (including journalists, researchers, activists, and concerned citizens conducted) in partnership with the Brazilian news outlet InfoAmazonia, we analyze audience expectations and consumption habits. Findings reveal a significant asynchrony between in-depth investigative reporting and audiences’ preferences on concise, visually-driven content like interactive maps and short videos. Data visualizations are shown to enhance credibility, but digital media platforms serve as the primary, yet algorithmically limited, gateway to access news. Moreover, audiences expressed a strong demand for greater representation of local and Indigenous voices, alongside more solutions-focused narratives in news stories. This research contributes to the existing literature and practice by offering insights for news media on how to produce relevant environmental content for audiences, advocating for a hybrid journalistic approach that balances rigorous data analysis with accessible, human-centered storytelling to foster deeper engagement and trust.

Respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is a significant cause of respiratory infections in young children. Since 2021, RSV has been a notifiable disease in Australia. However, current surveillance systems focus on hospitalised RSV, with limited surveillance at a community level through primary care clinics. This approach only captures RSV requiring hospitalisation. Less severe illnesses, while not captured, may have significant social and economic impacts including the associated cost of care and absenteeism. The aim of this study is to establish an understanding of the broader burden of RSV in young children in a community setting. The PATROL (Parents Actively Tracking RSV in Little Ones) project is a prospective longitudinal observational study of RSV and other respiratory viruses in children <5 years in community settings in metropolitan Perth, Western Australia. Over a 12-month surveillance period, parent/guardians will collect a mid-nasal swab from their child any time they meet the case definition or during one of the four screening points aligned with key points in the RSV season. Swabs will be tested for RSV and other respiratory viruses by PCR, with results returned to the parent/guardian. Rapid antigen tests for RSV, SARS-CoV-2 and Influenza A/B are provided for at-home testing in addition to PCR. Symptoms are reported by parents/guardians using MyCap, a phone-based application for REDCap.Incidence rates of RSV illness and asymptomatic carriage will be calculated and compared with the incidence rate ratios of other respiratory viruses. The Government of Western Australia Child and Adolescent Health Service Human Research Ethics Committee approved all study materials. Results and findings will be disseminated through manuscripts, conference abstracts and presentations, participant newsletters and appropriate general news media items.

News media has become increasingly supportive of women who report sexual assault, potentially increasing public support for survivors. Support in the news typically involves granting survivors agency, but theories of morality would predict that linking agency to survivors over perpetrators may have deleterious effects, leading readers to blame survivors more and perpetrators less. We hypothesized that a linguistic pattern in which survivors are framed more agentically than perpetrators is prevalent in news media and influences who readers blame. Across 1,738 sentences from 494 politically varied news articles, a linguistic pattern emerged; in liberal sources, survivors were framed more agentically than perpetrators. We tested how this pattern shaped blame. College participants (N = 1,238) read sentences where survivors or perpetrators were agentic. Men who read sentences framing survivors (vs. perpetrators) agentically blamed perpetrators less. These findings demonstrate how supportive language can inadvertently reinforce victim-blame by causing people to think perpetrators are less blameworthy.

One characteristic of the transition from low-choice to high‐choice media environments is the rise of political alternative news media. Few studies have so far focused on the longitudinal and reciprocal relationship between alternative media use and perceptions of societal problems. Building on the reinforcing spirals model, this study analyses the dynamic relationship between alternative media use and perceptions about three topics that vary in levels of baseline issue politicization: crime, economy, and health care. Using six-wave panel survey data collected in Sweden over three years, findings show that left-wing and right-wing alternative media use is more strongly related to perceptions of politicized than non-politicized issues. However, results from random-intercept cross-lagged panel models reveal few indications of within-person reciprocal dynamics. While users of left-wing and right-wing alternative media diverge significantly in the beliefs they hold about these issues, there is little evidence for media-driven belief reinforcement over time.

News media play a crucial role in communicating agricultural biotechnology tools such as genetically modified organisms (GMOs) and gene-edited crops to consumers, heavily influencing public perception of these technologies. This study assessed news media framing of gene editing in news reports in Ghana between 2021 and 2024. Underpinned by Media Framing Theory, we purposively selected and examined 56 reports from six online news platforms: three private and most read news portals and all three state-owned news media platforms. We found that while news reports were overwhelmingly pro-innovation centred—framing gene editing as a highly efficient scientific solution to agricultural challenges, consumer opinions and opposing viewpoints were notably absent. Academics, scientists and government officials advocating the technology were the more frequently quoted sources. We caution that the news media’s overreliance on elite sources for information, while excluding grassroot, critical and alternative perspectives, could trigger perceptions of elite manipulative intent (PEMI). This could potentially reinforce dominant narratives and may heighten public scepticism of the technology. We recommend increased attention and investment in science journalism, expanded resources for in-depth reporting, and redesigned training programs to equip journalists with both technical knowledge and critical skills. Notably, the majority of reports quoted local experts. This approach reinforces credibility of news coverage and is essential for building public confidence and trust in emerging technologies.

As politicians have come to challenge the role of media producers, there is a pressing need to understand how they participate in narrative contests. We address this need by analyzing social media data to offer insights into how Brazilian parliamentarians communicated during a crisis amid the Covid-19 pandemic. By investigating the connections politicians established with social media users, and the content they disseminated through their networks, we reveal three forms of narrative construction. Critics of the government engaged in what we call derivative reporting: They curated information from news media and adhered to journalistic content production formats, repackaging news to suit their agendas. While these politicians maintained ties with news media, the President’s allies severed those ties and presented themselves as alternative sources of information. These politicians established a communication ecosystem wherein the credibility of journalists was defied and state messages could be treated as authoritative truth. Local politicians skewed polarization, producing, instead, narratives about how they secured resources to solve the crisis. We discuss these modes of narrative construction as objectivity, authority, and proximity claims to epistemic authority, respectively. Our findings illuminate how political elites challenge what media sources ought to be trusted.

News media can shape public understanding of societal issues by either reinforcing divisions or promoting awareness. This study explores how Belgian newspapers framed discrimination between 2019 and 2023. Based on a qualitative analysis of 52 articles and a broader mapping of 513 news items, we identified four recurrent frames: Normalization (treating discrimination as ordinary), Deflection (downplaying it by questioning victims’ sensitivity), Solidarity (emphasizing empathy and collective action), and Regulation (highlighting institutional responsibility). These frames vary along two dimensions: whether discrimination is acknowledged as a systemic problem, and where responsibility is attributed. The Regulation frame emerged most frequently, pointing to a dominant emphasis on policy and institutional responses. Taken together, this study contributes conceptual tools to better understand how discrimination is constructed in mainstream Belgian news discourse.

ABSTRACT The public continues to rely on the news media for information about hate (or bias) crime, yet little is known about how news workers select bias crimes to cover in ways that may impact public and political discourse. Leveraging perspectives on news media construction, the current study explores how a myriad of offender-, victim-, and incident-level attributes are associated with measures of local, regional, and national print news media coverage of 216 bias murders occurring in the United States between 2000 and 2019. Findings reveal that most bias murders receive at least some coverage, especially in mid-sized regional papers. What makes homicides newsworthy in general, however, is unique from bias homicide in key ways. In addition, not all bias murders are equally likely to receive coverage, and some bias murders receive significantly more coverage than others. For example, fatal attacks targeting religious groups and immigrants were relatively more likely to be covered by news media compared to other victim groups. Several possible explanations are offered, including that deadly violence targeting these groups is more newsworthy because they are relatively rarer forms of violence, often result in more deaths, and may be thought to resonate more with news media audiences.

ABSTRACT This study examines how transit migrants from Sub-Saharan Africa are represented and framed in mainstream media across Libya, Morocco and Tunisia, three key North African countries along migration routes to Europe. Using a mixed-methods approach that combines framing analysis with multimodal critical discourse analysis (MCDA), the study considers framing as an exercise of power, emphasizing the role of competing actors and framing sponsors in constructing public discourse on Sub-Saharan transit migrants. To this end, the paper addresses three key questions: (1) What dominant frames characterize media coverage of Sub-Saharan transit migrants? (2) What discursive strategies construct these frames? (3) What power relations are embedded in these representations? The findings reveal a dominant emphasis on security and responsibility frames, often reinforced by discursive strategies that dehumanize migrants and obscure the structural drivers of migration. The study further demonstrates how media representations are shaped by racialized and biased discourses, where state actors instrumentalize North African news media for legitimacy building. These dynamics are compounded by broader regional power asymmetries, particularly the European Union’s efforts to externalize border control to North African states.

This study explores the intersection between social media discourse in West Sumatra and formal governmental processes, focusing on the cultural idiom Adat Basandi Syarak, Syarak Basandi Kitabullah (ABS–SBK). This Minangkabau moral framework is analyzed as a highly "amplifiable" tool within algorithmic media environments. Utilizing digital discourse analysis and online trace mapping, the research examines how moral emotions expressed online are magnified by media gatekeeping and subsequently integrated into formal policy deliberations. Theoretically, the study introduces "local-value-anchored digital populism" to explain how localized idioms become institutionally actionable within Indonesia’s regional politics. Data sources include social media content from key figures, user interactions, news reports, and official documents. The findings reveal a recurring affective-institutional pattern: digital emotions are amplified by news media and then translated by local authorities and customary institutions into formal regulations or initiatives. This dynamic emerges from the convergence of three forces: public emotions, social media algorithms, and institutional structures. When used as a moral frame, the ABS–SBK idiom bridges public affective responses with state procedures, transforming local values into policy language and sources of political legitimacy. Consequently, digital populism in West Sumatra serves as a form of symbolic power construction. It reconfigures the relationship between religion, customary authority, and the state within the digital public sphere, moving beyond mere value-based communication to influence formal institutional channels like bylaws and customary councils.

ABSTRACT Following the 2022 Uvalde school shooting, we explored the intermedia agenda-setting dynamics between traditional news media (national and local outlets) and Twitter (now X). Using Latent Dirichlet Allocation topic modeling and cross-lagged correlation, we analyzed media content from Twitter as well as national and local news organizations. The results showed that in the immediate aftermath of the shooting, national news media had the power to influence the agenda of both Twitter and local media. Over time, this influence soon disappeared, and a reciprocal relationship emerged across all media types. Additionally, distinct patterns of media coverage emerged. While traditional news media tended to focus more on broader societal issues, particularly gun control, discussions on Twitter emphasized the victims’ stories and responses from policymakers.

ABSTRACT In 1988, the Anti-Drug Abuse Act authorized the use of the death penalty for individuals who committed murder while involved in certain federal drug crimes. In recent years, as America has grappled with rising opioid overdose deaths, there has been an increase in calls for expanding murder charges and capital punishment for individuals who deliver drugs that result in an overdose death. Utilizing content analysis of news media and presidential speeches, this paper explores the claims-making process surrounding the arguments in favor of sentencing people who deal drugs to death during the 1980s and the contemporary opioid crisis. Findings demonstrate that three rhetorical tactics were employed during the Reagan and Trump Administrations to garner support for this practice: focusing on intent and impact of drug dealing, engaging in the argumentative fallacy of appealing to emotion, and utilizing racial scapegoating. Such claims seek to widen the definition of murder, in turn broadening the criminalization of people who use drugs. Such an approach may increase the number of overdose deaths by undermining Good Samaritan Laws and impacting the likelihood that users will contact emergency services during an overdose event, thus undermining the purported intent of these policies to reduce overdose deaths.

As generative AI becomes increasingly common in news media, newsrooms are trying to find the most effective and reliable ways to communicate this AI use to audiences. This paper aims to unravel audience perspectives regarding the purpose of AI transparency, motivations for desiring transparency, expectations of journalists using AI, and perceptions of different AI labeling approaches to guide the implementation of effective and responsible AI disclosure. Through in-depth interviews with a sample of news consumers in the U.S (N = 20), we find that audiences are less concerned with the technicalities of generative AI content creation but rather, based on their expectations of journalists, they value labeling that signals human-AI collaboration and visible human oversight. By focusing on audience expectations and perceptions, we contribute practical and theoretical insights to the literature on AI labeling.

ABSTRACT The active expansion of digital media, as well as social networking services, has raised the dispersion of false information and fake news to serious issues, which put pressure on society, its opinion, and democracy itself. Manual verification is not easy and efficient since fake news tend to spread more rapidly than real news because it is sensational. The current research provides NEWSGUARD, a smart system that is aimed at the automated fake news detection relying on a hybrid method of using machine learning and deep learning techniques. The suggested system proposes the use of Natural Language Processing (NLP) in processing of text and extracting features. Term Frequency-Inverse Document Frequency (TF-IDF) is used to create statistical features whereas semantic representations are retrieved with word embeddings. Various classification models are deployed, such as Naive Bayes, Logistic Regression, Support Vector Machine (SVM), Convolutional Neural Networks (CNN) and Long short-term memory (LSTM). The hybrid model is created that combines the benefits of both machine learning and deep learning models and allows achieving better performance in classification. The experimental findings show that the hybrid model has a higher performance compared to the individual models where it has a high accuracy with a high precision, recall and F1 score. This research result demonstrates the usefulness of statistical and semantic features as a combination to detect fake news. The suggested NEWSGUARD solution offers the scalable, correct, and effective tool to fight with the misinformation, and it will be able to be further improved by using advanced models and real-time implementation.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is becoming increasingly integrated into everyday life, changing the media landscape and at the same time creating new risks. This study examines the impact of AI on modern media, with a particular focus on disinformation. Technologies such as automated journalism, personalized recommendations, deepfake videos and AI-generated imagery increase efficiency, but also increase the potential for manipulation of public opinion. Addressing these challenges requires an integrated approach that combines technological solutions, regulatory frameworks, ethical standards and media literacy. AI-enabled fact-checking and governance mechanisms are essential to mitigate risks. The paper analyzes the dual impact of AI and proposes a multi-dimensional strategy to reduce disinformation and protect the integrity of information, while supporting informed public discourse. Empirically, the study is based on a survey of 43 Georgian journalists and uses a logistic regression model. The findings reveal a statistically significant relationship between exposure to AI-generated content and the perceived risk of disinformation.

In the U.S., extreme heat is the leading cause of weather-related fatalities. Farmers, ranchers and other outdoor workers who are exposed to the elements and engaged in strenuous physical activity are disproportionately impacted. This manuscript summarizes the number and severity of heat-related illnesses and injuries collected through the AgInjuryNews.org system, highlights their characteristics, provides recommendations for farmworkers and employers, and calls for future research. Heat-related illness cases from 2016–2024 were analyzed. Fourteen agricultural heat-related incidents covered by U.S. media were identified. Most incidents took place in June and July. A content analysis was conducted to identify news articles that included mention of prevention strategies, laws and regulations related to working conditions, or OSHA. Over half of the cases were from southern states. Eleven of the incidents involved male farmworkers, one involved a male farmer, and two involved first responders (gender unspecified). All of the farmer/farmworker incidents were single-victim fatalities. Seven articles mentioned prevention strategies, ten mentioned laws or regulations, and nine mentioned OSHA, often cursory. These findings suggest that media reports provide a limited and selective image of agricultural heat-related injuries, with coverage emphasizing fatalities and investigation information more often than prevention.