Visual Frame Research Articles

Streaming disasters on TikTok: Examining social mediated crisis communication, public engagement, and emotional responses during the 2023 Maui wildfire

Short video-sharing platforms, such as TikTok, play a significant role in allowing the public to experience natural disasters vicariously, share information, and coordinate peer-led disaster relief efforts. With emerging platforms like TikTok providing experientially immersive content, the role of digital storytelling in stimulating public engagement and emotions remains underexplored. Drawing from narrative persuasion theory and visual storytelling literature, the current study proposes an integrated framework to examine the storyteller, visual frame, and digital presentation characteristics of TikTok videos in predicting social-mediated public engagement and emotional reactions surrounding a recent natural disaster, the 2023 Maui Wildfire. Using visual content analysis and computational methods, the study analyzed 526 TikTok videos and 59,950 associated comments. Results showed that audiovisual vividness consistently predicted all three types of disaster engagement. In contrast, storyteller type, storytelling frame, and other presentation characteristics inconsistently predicted information consumption intention, information sharing intention, and emotional reactions on TikTok.

Sensory experience beyond vision: Shah Tahmasb’s sixteenth-century garden in Qazvin

In this article, we examine the grand compendium of verses composed by Abdi Beg Shirazi (1515–80/1) in the middle decades of the sixteenth century, which portrays the royal Sa’ādat-Ābād complex of the second Safavid ruler Shah Tahmasb (1524–76). Through careful reading and interpretation of these poems, both individually and as part of the larger structure of the compendium, we revisit the symbolism and mode of perception of gardens in the early-modern Persianate world. Contributing to the scholarship on the sensory turn, we argue that Shirazi’s portrayal of royal gardens as a terrestrial paradise relied on senses and experiences rather than on the formal properties of these gardens. The poet presented the garden as a set of cognitive episodes rather than visual frames. As such, Abdi Beg Shirazi’s text offers a compelling insight into the perception and reception of gardens in the early-modern Persianate world that helps expand the scope of current scholarship on the subject.

The Effect of Seeing Paintings or Photojournalistic Images Depicting Refugees on Their Infrahumanisation

Abstract Images are powerful cultural agents that can inform, shape and change the attitudes and behaviours of viewers. The ways in which marginalised groups are depicted in photographs shape people's attitudes towards them. For example, viewing photojournalistic images portraying refugees in large rather than small groups results in the infrahumanisation of refugees. However, the impact of artworks vs photojournalistic images depicting refugees on their infrahumanisation remains a key and unexplored topic. In this pre-registered study, we investigated whether viewing different types of visual images (e.g., paintings vs photographs) of refugees using distinct visual framings (e.g., large or small groups) influences viewers' infrahumanisation of refugees and the intensity and valence of the viewers' felt emotions. Contrary to our predictions, no evidence was found for an effect of visual framing (large vs small groups) and different image types (paintings vs photos) portraying refugees on their infrahumanisation. Moreover, and in line with our predictions, photojournalistic images were evaluated as more emotionally intense than paintings, whereas paintings rather than photojournalistic images engaged more positive emotions, demonstrating that different types of images involve distinct affective responses. Furthermore, exploratory findings revealed that increased positive appraisals of photojournalistic images depicting small groups rather than large groups led to greater humanisation of refugees. This suggests that positive emotions can decrease the infrahumanisation of marginalized groups, particularly when these are evoked by photojournalistic images. Overall, these findings shed new light on the effects of audience exposure to different forms of visual representation and their social and emotional consequences.

Visual Frame Analysis

This article presents a project of methodologically applying and conceptually adjusting Goffman's frame analysis to studying visual social life: what is going on, and how, in the abundance of visual scenes that we increasingly navigate through in our everyday lives. Visual frame analysis is a methodological approach that addresses images as a part of the world people need to make sense of and proposes tools to address different sets of visual situations. Two examples from previous research illustrate this methodological suggestion: one analyzing dominant and secondary frames of gender representations in the covers of periodical magazines, and another analyzing keyings of visual politicization in activist website images. Finally, the article discusses further possibilities of applying such an analysis, e.g., combined with AI based tools, to the abundance of image flows on social media.

Visual Aesthetics Semiotics Roland Barthes Photography Journalistic Works Phenomenal World

Documentary photography as a medium of conveying information and documentation can document reality and tell important stories with integrity and honesty. Where journalistic photography will continue to be a powerful tool in reporting the truth and influencing social change, giving us a window into a wider and more diverse world. This research visually analyzes the phenomenal works of world photography from the aesthetic side with Roland Barthes' semiotic approach. It tells that aesthetically the photograph is an embodiment of visual beauty immortalized by the photographer not only by chance in capturing a moment that once existed. This research is conducted qualitatively descriptively according to Bogdan and Guba and proves that the science of photography does not only rely on luck but needs to understand how to photograph, the concept of visual framing in one frame that can be accepted by the general public as a conveyance of messages, information, and impressions from a photograph itself based on photographic theories.

Visual Framing of Climate Change in Selected Newspapers in Kenya

Raw information on issues such as climate change and the environment can be incomprehensible and meaningless to segments of the media audience. To ease audience's understanding of such information, the media may filter and (re)construct both the information and the experiences that generated it; this is called framing. This study analysed how climate change is visually framed in selected print media in a bid to understand how this could influence the audience's understanding of climate change information. This study was guided by the Framing Theory. Data was collected from two newspapers in Kenya (The Standard and Daily Nation) published between January 2013 and December 2017 which were purposively sampled due to their wide circulation and coverage. Qualitative content analysis was used both as a methodology and a data collection tool and the data analysed thematically. The study findings indicated that visuals were rarely used in the selected newspapers. From the findings, the depiction of actors was mainly based on their social class. The most dominant visual frame was the politicians and talking head frame. A new frame that was depicted in this study was the humour imagery frame. The causes of climate change are depicted as small causes and small solutions, but the impacts are depicted as large scale which can lead to low self-efficacy amongst the citizens. This study concludes that visual framing of climate change is an area not fully embraced by the media in presenting climate change, yet it offers an array of opportunities to communicate the climate change message.

The thousand faces of images in AI news: psychological distance, dialectical relationships and sensationalism

ABSTRACT Existing research on media coverage of AI has mostly focused on textual analysis with a lack of attention to visual factors presented in news. Moreover, studies of visual framing often rely on a small sample of manually labeled images and thus suffer from a low ecological validity. To address these issues, we used image data obtained from AItopics to cluster the images through the Resnet50 deep learning model and Kmeans++. Three major visual frames based on 10 clustering results were identified via open coding: psychological distance, dialectical relationships, and sensationalism. Specifically, by displaying a more lifelike and materialistic image of AI, news may shorten the psychological distance between readers and AI; by juxtaposing two opposite entities, news may reinforce a dialectical relationship between humans and AI; through the use of colors and symbols, news may become sensationalized and elicit affective reactions from readers. Our findings provide a new framework for analyzing media visuals about AI, and highlight the need that media reporting be more comprehensive, balanced, and objective in their selection of images to communicate topics of the like.

Visual framing during crisis: a 10-year systematic review

PurposeThis paper presents a 10-year systematic review of research on the visual framing of crises to identify the priorities, theories applied and trends in the scholarship of visual framing during crises. The gaps are analyzed to provide evidence-based recommendations for advancing future research.Design/methodology/approachA total of 269 articles published in 156 peer-reviewed communication journals between January 2014 to December 2023 were reviewed. Data were analyzed using open and axial qualitative coding. A codebook was developed for the quantitative coding and data were analyzed in SPSS descriptive statistics and chi-square tests to answer the research questions.FindingsThe proportion of visual framing of crises has remained the same in the last 10 years – there is significantly more research on the visual framing of non-crises. Overall, research on the visual framing of crises is largely exploratory/descriptive and could benefit from a research agenda that is more theory driven. Additionally, there is a skewed focus for research on North America compared to other regions, and for political communication and climate compared to other themes. Environmental sciences and engineering are the most widely investigated journal fields, while disaster is the most common typology studied when looking at the visual framing of crises.Research limitations/implicationsThe systematic literature review has some limitations – most particularly that the sample was drawn from a single publisher, which may not be exhaustive enough to represent the full population of articles in the field of visual communication. However, it is a systematic review of the publications that are officially aligned with three of the major communication organizations – the International Communication Association, National Communication Association and World Communication Association. However, future research considering the inclusion of an additional publishers, like Emerald, would further enrich scholarship in visual framing during crises. Second, manual coding of the articles could present potential differences in analysis and interpretation by other researchers. Despite the limitations, the study also provides some important insights into the present and future of the visual framing of crises.Practical implicationsAddressing gaps in the internationalization of visual crisis communication would expand studies for visual framing among underrepresented communities such as populations with low reading literacy, gender minorities and displaced communities and inform visual framing strategies for government and relevant institutions as primary information disseminators during crises.Social implicationsAddressing the gaps identified in this systematic literature review on the visual framing of crises is important for extending theory in this relatively nascent field and guiding crisis visual framing strategies to mitigate uncertainty and panic, threats to stakeholder relationships, social vulnerabilities and the visual framing of stakeholder-centric crisis responses.Originality/valueBased on available literature, this is the first systematic literature review investigating the use of all types of visuals used during all crisis typologies, reflecting the ubiquity of crises and the increased focus on the use of visuals in crisis communication in the last decade.

Rise of Digital Influencer Marketing

Virtual influencer marketing is a global emerging phenomenon in social media research. Research on traditional influencer marketing and practices has been the locus of attention for years, but fairly scarce research deals with the rise and influence of virtual influencers, also known as artificial intelligence influencers (AIIs) or computer-generated influencers (CGIs). In this article, an explorative, qualitative single case analysis of the Japanese CGI influencer Imma is presented to identify how the CGI is visually constructed on Instagram in a marketing campaign. Two supplementary semiotic lenses are applied, i.e. a visual compositional analysis and a semiotic image analysis. The results indicate that the CGI influencer Imma is visually presented by and large with the same characteristics and attributes as found in similar studies of human influencers. Moreover, the findings indicate subtle yet essential differences in the visual framing of the CGI character to enhance a human-like appearance. Concludingly, this study has preliminary implications for research, practitioners, prospective marketers, and future innovation leaders in the virtual marketing industry, and it is proposed to consider reconceptualizing our understanding of virtual influencers and acknowledging the rise of Virtual Influencer Marketing as a field in its own right.

Effects of Visual Framing in Multimodal Media Environments: A Systematic Review of Studies Between 1979 and 2023

Framing is considered an important theoretical perspective for analyzing the influence of media information. Despite the explicit inclusion of visual elements within established frame definitions, visuals have long been marginalized in framing research. Based on a systematic review of 552 articles addressing visual framing, this article closely investigates 72 empirical studies on visual/multimodal framing effects. Drawing on framing as a multidimensional process, we discuss how existing studies have examined the sensory, affective, cognitive, and behavioral dimensions of impact. We explain the rising importance of visual communication and multimodality and conclude with implications for mass communication and visual journalism.

Analyzing the Communication of Poverty Governance: A Study of Multimodal News Framing and Engagement on Chinese TikTok

Poverty communication is a critical yet challenging aspect of promoting sustainable development goals (SDGs) globally. This study explores poverty-related news narratives on Douyin (China’s TikTok) and examines their impact on user engagement (likes, shares, and comments). The primary objective is to refine communication strategies aimed at alleviating poverty. Drawing primarily on the news framing theory, this study analyzes 400 short-video news from Douyin in 2020 through regression analysis, complemented by insights from Chinese mobile news practitioners. Findings suggest that episodic-gain coverage, which emphasizes real-life scenarios and individual determination, effectively engages users. Visual framing devices, including action-driven and speech-driven opening scenes, captivate viewers and mobilize social support. Additionally, this study reveals that storytelling redundancy enhances news engagement by improving perceptual fluency in short videos. Moreover, tailored rhetorical strategies for short videos, such as subjective expressions and question-based headlines, further evoke the exchange of users’ social values. In conclusion, Douyin plays a central role in the ongoing process of media convergence in China. The study explores how platforms such as Douyin can promote SDGs, encourage public participation in addressing poverty and social care, and provide valuable insights for news content creators seeking to enhance storytelling and engagement in mobile media.

When consumers prefer visual blessing frame design on gift packaging: The role of interpersonal distance

AbstractExisting literature on gift‐giving mainly views gifts and blessings as intertwined into a single entity. Our research, however, has found that visual blessing frames—visual boundaries that encircle the blessing text—can separate blessings from gifts and emphasize the blessings, thereby satisfying givers who choose gifts for interpersonally distant recipients. Across three experiments (involving a total of 1228 participants) via the Credamo platform, we explored the interplay between visual blessing frames and giver‐recipient interpersonal distance on gift evaluation. Specifically, when choosing gifts for interpersonally distant recipients, givers favor gifts adorned with visual blessing frames over those without such designs; however, this effect is attenuated when choosing gifts for close recipients. Moreover, we demonstrate that this effect is driven by givers' perception that visual blessing frames strengthen blessings. These findings contribute to the existing body of knowledge on visual frames and gift‐giving, while also offering practical implications for gift packaging designers.

Mediatization and Mystique. Volodymyr Zelensky’s Self-Presentation on Instagram

RESEARCH OBJECTIVE: This study uses mediatization theory and Goffman’s concept of self-presentation to explain the inseparable role of social media in the rise of Volodymyr Zelensky in Ukrainian politics and, since the Russian invasion, world consciousness. From the start, his political persona has been governed far more by media logic than political calculation, although the former has translated into the latter. THE RESEARCH PROBLEM AND METHODS: The analysis explores how Zelensky develops an iconic communication style through visual framing and other mediation techniques. Towards this end, we conduct a visual content analysis of images posted to his official Instagram account across three points in time: his candidacy, presidency before the invasion, and first year of the invasion. 100 images are sampled from each time period and subjected to detailed visual and nonverbal analysis. THE PROCESS OF ARGUMENTATION: Employing framing theory and Goffman’s notion of self-presentation, the study explains the Ukrainian leader’s skillful use of visual and nonverbal messaging to project an image of an everyman president and, beginning with the February 2022 invasion, emergent soldier-in-chief. The analysis also shows how specific visual appeals (e.g., facial expressions, Ukrainian symbols) and background settings influence Zelensky’s presentation over time. RESEARCH RESULTS: Results show how the inclusion of more political, and then diplomatic and military, elites in posts during his presidency and year one of the invasion positions Zelensky as a recognized leader while solidifying his status as soldier-in-chief. Indeed, the ubiquity and universality of his soldier persona have become a widely recognized symbol of the fight for democratic freedom. CONCLUSIONS, INNOVATIONS, AND RECOMMENDATIONS: The study illustrates how Zelensky utilizes social media, Instagram in particular, as a platform for compelling self-presentation while communicating a message of national unity and resolve. His ubiquitous media presence has introduced a new perspective on leadership during wartime.

The influence of visual and textual frames on people’s perception of migrants

This study investigated how the combination of textual and visual frames influences the attribution of responsibility for arrest and deportation of undocumented migrants and empathy. A 3 visual frame: (no photo, stereotypical photo, counter-stereotypical photo) × 2 textual frame: (episodic, thematic) between-subjects online experiment revealed that including a counter-stereotypical photograph in both episodic and thematic news stories had a positive effect on empathy for undocumented migrants but did not affect responsibility for arrest and deportation. Adding a stereotypical photograph to an episodic news story significantly reduced societal responsibility for arrest and deportation and decreased the level of empathy.

A paradoxical misperception of relative motion.

Motion perception is considered a hyperacuity. The presence of a visual frame of reference to compute relative motion is necessary to achieve this sensitivity [Legge, Gordon E., and F. W. Campbell. "Displacement detection in human vision." Vision Research 21.2 (1981): 205-213.]. However, there is a special condition where humans are unable to accurately detect relative motion: images moving in a direction consistent with retinal slip where the motion is unnaturally amplified can, under some conditions, appear stable [Arathorn, David W., et al. "How the unstable eye sees a stable and moving world." Journal of Vision 13.10.22 (2013)]. In this study, we asked: Is world-fixed retinal image background content necessary for the visual system to compute the direction of eye motion to render in the percept images moving with amplified slip as stable? Or, are non-visual cues sufficient? Subjects adjusted the parameters of a stimulus moving in a random trajectory to match the perceived motion of images moving contingent to the retina. Experiments were done with and without retinal image background content. The perceived motion of stimuli moving with amplified retinal slip was suppressed in the presence of visual content; however, higher magnitudes of motion were perceived under conditions with no visual cues. Our results demonstrate that the presence of retinal image background content is essential for the visual system to compute its direction of motion. The visual content that might be thought to provide a strong frame of reference to detect amplified retinal slips, instead paradoxically drives the misperception of relative motion.

Visualising War / Peace Photographs: A Comparative Analysis of Selected Asian News Sites’ Coverage of the 2022 Russian-Ukrainian Conflict

Abstract This study analyses the visual coverage of the 2022 Russian-Ukrainian conflict on Asian news sites, utilising the frameworks of war and peace journalism. Conducting a content analysis of 397 images from seven leading Asian news sites, we contribute to the literature on visual coverage, particularly from online platforms. Our analysis identifies the predominant visual narratives employed by these news sites and offers insights into variations in coverage intensity, regional and ethnic focuses, portrayal of age groups, and depiction of harm. The study extends the understanding of framing theory by analysing visual frames, providing valuable implications for future visual studies and contributing to a deeper understanding of conflict portrayal in online news media.

Visual frame analysis of the UKIP leave campaigns ‘Turkish migrant’ Brexit visuals

ABSTRACT The lead up to the 23 June 2016 democratic divorce of the United Kingdom from the European Union observed rigorous campaigning from the ‘Leave’ and ‘Remain’ spectrums. Immigration was high on the agenda, with UKIP’s leave campaign commissioning seven visuals focusing on migration from Turkey, with this anti-immigration rhetoric receiving much criticism. This study analysed these visuals by performing a semiotic and visual frame analysis. The findings present important indications of how politicians utilize existing connotations and ‘othering’ ideologies to influence political decisions, and the messages in accordance with the socio-political climate prevalent at the time. It was found that the visuals relied heavily on connotations appropriated upon the Turkish identity, and their previously invested-in self-other ideologies, enabling the visuals to transcend a greater message. Simultaneously, pre-existing antagonism connected to immigration was also utilized within a setting of political distrust. The rhetoric promoted basing Brexit on Turkey’s entrance to the Union, omitting the Union from the equation and question.

Visual Framing of Afghan Refugees in Global News Media

This study content analyzed visual frames of Afghan refugees during the first six months of the Taliban’s second regime (from August 15, 2021, to February 15, 2022). A total of N = 1,948 images from the Associated Press were quantitatively analyzed for focal point, topic, tone, depiction, gender, and age. The findings indicate that Afghan refugees were predominantly the primary focal points of the AP images, with significantly more positive and active frames than negative and passive frames. In contrast to previous research on the framing of Afghan women in Western media before the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan, Afghan women were framed significantly as more positive and active than Afghan men in the photos.

‘Behold, it’s new’: Photojournalism and political communication in Zimbabwe

Visuals hold a special place in the field of communication. Politicians, in a move to position themselves or market their activities, use visuals that stand as a testimony to their principles. However, their importance and value in political communication are not highly reflected in academic literature. This article is built from this understudied field by looking at the role photojournalists play in framing opposition political parties in Zimbabwe. Photographs are important tools in politics as evidenced by experimental research on political communication that found that ‘a single photograph can have a clear impact on voters’ judgements regarding a candidate’s demeanour, competence, leadership ability, attractiveness, likeableness, and integrity’. This study seeks to analyse photographs that were used by photojournalists to frame the newly formed political party, amidst the power struggles within the party, and political repression from the authoritarian regime. Informed by visual framing, the study found that photojournalists framed Nelson Chamisa as youthful and vibrant while his party was seen as resembling the new dawn. However, photographs also showed that Chamisa and his party had nothing to offer as they did not have a constitution, guiding policy nor a clear ideology.

Automation of visual communication and aesthetic construction of national image: a computational aesthetic analysis of social bots on Twitter

Abstract Vision and aesthetics are inseparable dimensions of national image building. Based on 106,562 China-related images from Twitter (renamed as X), this paper introduced a computational aesthetic approach to investigate the visual communication activities of social bots on Twitter and compared the similarities and differences between human and bot accounts’ posted images so as to explore the influence of social bots’ aesthetic strategies. The results show that social bots have displayed different aesthetic strategies in the construction of the China-related visual frame, and formed obvious stylistic differences with humans in brightness, saturation, color, etc. Negative binomial regression indicates that the aesthetic strategies of social bots contribute to more likes and shares. The automation of visual communication and aesthetic construction not only makes the global building and communication of national image face new situations and challenges, but also pushes the whole human visual aesthetic, creation, and communication activities under the potential subjectivity crisis.