Setting the Public Fear Agenda: A Longitudinal Analysis of Network TV Crime Reporting, Public Perceptions of Crime, and FBI Crime Statistics

Lowry, Dennis T.; Nio, Tarn Ching Josephine; Leitner, Dennis W.

doi:10.1111/j.1460-2466.2003.tb03005.x

Cited by 114 publications

(20 citation statements)

References 19 publications

(18 reference statements)

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“…In addition, numerous studies have found that fear of attack is an important predictor of people carrying weapons to protect themselves 25. To date, few studies have directly examined the effect of media coverage on the uptake of weapons, but several recent US population studies have found that extensive media coverage is linked to increases in gun purchases and applications for gun licences in the aftermath of mass shootings 262728. While the evidence is at present limited to US studies, it suggests that mass publicity of violent events may prompt increases in self protective behaviours, including carrying weapons.…”

Section: Are We Fuelling the Fire?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Violence in England and Wales: does media reporting match the data?

Humphreys

Esposti

Gardner

et al. 2019

BMJ

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Data sources on serious violence Supplementary Table 1 summarises the three data sources we used to estimate trends in serious violence in England and Wales from 2002 to 2018. We manually extracted the count data from annual reports for Mortality Statistics and Hospital Episode Statistics (HES), 1,2 and derived rates per 1000 population using the Office for National Statistics' MidYear Population Estimates for England and Wales. 3 Rates per 1000 population were already estimated for Attendances to Emergency Departments by the National Violence Surveillance Network (at Cardiff University). We extracted these estimated rates from the National Violence Surveillance Network's annual reports. 4 The data and code for replicating the graphs included in the manuscript and are freely available at Github (https://github.com/DKHumphreys). Mortality Statistics. As described in Supplementary Table 1, Mortality Statistics use ICD codes based on information from medical certificates. Contrary to police-recorded homicides which uses a subtractive approach, the data generation process for mortality statistics uses an additive approach, where deaths by homicides are added following coroner inquests. This means that homicide figures (ICD codes: X85-Y09, including late effects of assault Y87.1) for more recent years may underestimate the true number of homicides while inquests and investigations are still pending.

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Section: Are We Fuelling the Fire?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Violence in England and Wales: does media reporting match the data?

Humphreys

Esposti

Gardner

et al. 2019

BMJ

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Additionally, public perceptions of crime have shown to be mostly driven by the prominence of this topic on the (television) news agenda rather than by actual crime rates (Lowry, Nio, & Leitner, 2003). Viewing the (local) news, therefore, has been shown to cause concerns about and fear of crime (Gerbner, 1988;Romer, Jamieson, & Aday, 2003).…”

Section: News Consumption and Mental Well-beingmentioning

confidence: 99%

News Consumption and Its Unpleasant Side Effect

Boukes

Vliegenthart

2017

Journal of Media Psychology

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News consumption and its unpleasant side effectBoukes, M.; Vliegenthart, R. General rights It is not permitted to download or to forward/distribute the text or part of it without the consent of the author(s) and/or copyright holder(s), other than for strictly personal, individual use, unless the work is under an open content license (like Creative Commons). Disclaimer/Complaints regulationsIf you believe that digital publication of certain material infringes any of your rights or (privacy) interests, please let the Library know, stating your reasons. In case of a legitimate complaint, the Library will make the material inaccessible and/or remove it from the website. Please Ask the Library: http://uba.uva.nl/en/contact, or a letter to: Library of the University of Amsterdam, Secretariat, Singel 425, 1012 WP Amsterdam, The Netherlands. You will be contacted as soon as possible. Abstract Following the news is generally understood as crucial for democracy as it allows citizens to politically participate in an informed manner; yet, one may wonder about the unintended side effects it has for the mental well-being of citizens. With news focusing on the negative and worrisome events in the world, framing that evokes a sense of powerlessness, and lack of entertainment value, this study hypothesizes that news consumption decreases mental well-being via negative hedonic experiences; thereby, we differentiate between hard and soft news. Using a panel survey in combination with latent growth curve modeling (n = 2767), we demonstrate that the consumption of hard news television programs has a negative effect on the overtime development of mental well-being. Soft news consumption, by contrast, has a marginally positive impact on the trend in well-being. This can be explained by the differential topic focus, framing and style of soft news vis-a-vis hard news. Investigating the effects of news consumption on mental well-being provides insight into the impact news exposure has on variables other than the political ones, which definitively are not less societally relevant.Keywords: news consumption; mental well-being; hedonic experiences; negativity; hard versus soft news.1 Please refer to this paper as follows: Boukes, M. & Vliegenthart, R. (2017). News consumption and its unpleasant side effect: Studying the effect of hard and soft news exposure on mental well-being over time. Italy; the Amsterdam police fighting drugs-related crime; an 11 year-old boy who stabbed two other boys in Landgraaf; the war in Ukraine; more children being hospitalized for alcohol abuse; Ebola in Liberia; financial problems of the European Union regarding Greece; the development of artificial skin for people with health problems. Except for the last, a long list of stories that probably not leave the viewer with feelings of joy and hope (i.e., hedonic experiences) but may rather evoke anger and fear.Following the news, nevertheless, is generally understood to be desirable behavior as it would be crucial for the functioning of democracy (Althaus, 2012). ...

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“…For instance, research has shown that women have a greater affinity than men for victims of crime in news reports, and affinity was strongly related to fear of crime, even after adjusting for own perceived safety (Chiricos, Eschholz, & Gertz, 1997). In addition, media coverage of crime in the local area is often exaggerated and may cue people that crime can unexpectedly occur in their own homes (Lowry, Nio, & Leitner, 2003). It is possible that county-level crime rates become a key aspect of a county’s “identity” that is well known to its residents, even if they live in less-affected areas of the county.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%