The experiment investigates visual framing effects of news stories on readers'(1) emotional response, (2) evaluation of communicative quality, (3) journalistic credibility and (4) objectivity, and (5) perception of actor representation. Three versions of a news report about the Gaza conflict were used. While the text remained the same, different images were added representing visual human-interest framing, visual political framing, and no visual framing. Visual human-interest framing elicited stronger emotional responses, higher values concerning the communicative quality, and had an impact on the perceived actor representation. No differences in objectivity and credibility were found among the three stimuli.

This study uses the online discourse surrounding an Austrian publicly-funded study about "Islamic kindergartens" as a case study to approach communication about the social sciences in the online public sphere. Results from a discourse analysis of 937 user comments in online forums of two Austrian daily newspapers show that the social sciences are often referred to as a "special case". While some use this argument to neglect its societal relevance, others use it to highlight its role as societal problem solver. Moreover, users discuss characteristics of "true" social scientists and scrutinise the independence of institutionalised social science. AbstractPublic perception of science and technology; Science and media; Science and policy-making Keywords https://doi.

The article presents the results of a qualitative documentary image interpretation of the visual discourse of the Hong Kong protests on the Twitter hashtag #hongkongprotests. Visual thematic patterns, the actors depicted, and the relations between actors as well as visual perspectives were analyzed to derive the function of visual images and to give insights into visual protest storytelling. Visuals and image-text relations in Tweets within #hongkongprotests revealed an application of images in clear favor of the protest movement taking an 'at the scene'/'on the ground' perspective, with media workers being active in front of the camera rather than mere observers behind the camera. While the approach used proved to be suitable for the research project, the research design comes with some limitations, for example in terms of the nongeneralizability of results.

Irmgard Wetzstein Department of Communication University of Vienna AustriaVerena Grubmüller-Régent University of Applied Sciences Vienna Austria Katharina Götsch University of Vienna AustriaKarin Rainer AEI Agency for European Integration and Economic Development Vienna, AustriaWetzstein, Grubmüller-Régent, Götsch, & Rainer 96 publications, pilot projects, and practical initiatives (Doan, Vo, & Collier, 2011;Johansson, Brynielsson, & Quijano, 2012;Nilsson et al., 2012;Rainer, Grubmüller, Pejic, Götsch, & Leitner, 2013). The link between social media and crises is not surprising, given the prominence that interactive Web 2.0 services have attained within the past decade. As Grubmüller, Götsch, and Krieger (2013) emphasize, microblogging services, such as Twitter, and social networks, such as Facebook, have taken on an immense role in peoples' daily lives-not only in the developed world. Easy and mobile accessibility has paved the way for the unprecedented success of social media, allowing "many-to-many" communication, and changing our notion of concepts such as sharing, open access, and privacy. As Omand, Bartlett, and Miller (2012, p. 9) pointed out, "We are transferring more and more of our lives onto vast digital social commons." This is also true for the expression of political opinions, mobilization, and community self-organization:technologies offer a wide range of possibilities for engagement, participation, communication and collaboration as they allow each and every individual with internet access to publish, share or edit comments, postings, videos, photos etc. This implies new possibilities of interaction, diverse news and opinions, engagement in the form of "one-toone, one-to-many and many-to-many communications." (Grubmüller et al., 2013, p. 2)

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Based on the concept of public diplomacy, this article analyses the possible contributions of journalism to international political conflict resolution processes and, more specifically, asks if quality journalism can take on mediative functions in foreign policy. The approach of this article is to consider the concept of ‘mediative journalism’, which means that first of all links and differences between journalism and mediation as a conflict resolution tool have to be recognized. An explicit link between mediation and quality journalism has not been tested yet, although both show partly similar mindsets and attitudes concerning, for example, balance, the plurality of perspectives and critical reflection, as the article clearly shows.

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