Effects of Visual Framing on Emotional Responses and Evaluations of News Stories about the Gaza Conflict 2009

Abstract

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.