Suchergebnisse

The predominant frames in news media representations of migration issues shape attitudes towards refugees. Being mostly confronted with negative news frames, people may be less inclined to believe stories that stress positive aspects of immigration. However, the frames' positive implementation hinges on their presumed credibility. The aim of this study is to better understand both how young and adult Flemings perceive dominant news frames concerning refugees and how they are affected by them. We distinguish between young people and adults since they differ in their news media use, news attitudes, and opinion towards refugees. Accordingly, a randomized, post-test, only between-subjects survey experiment was conducted ( N = 2424). Our results show that young people are more receptive than adults to media messages, regardless of a positive or negative connotation. Furthermore, our study confirms that the perceived credibility of a news frame is associated with the audience's attitudes to migration, since an audience demonstrates a clear tendency to only accept the relevant frames as true, if they align with their own views.

This study examines how household composition and news media consumption and trust are related to attitudes towards two minority groups -immigrants and refugees- in a representative sample of the adult population (n = 6000) in Belgium, Sweden, France, and the Netherlands. We find that Swedes hold the most positive attitudes towards both groups, while the French are found to be most negative. The Belgians and Dutch hold moderate attitudes. There is also evidence that attitudes on refugees are more negative than attitudes on immigrants in Sweden and France, but not in Belgium and the Netherlands. Using structural equation modeling, we find that household composition is not directly related to attitudes, but indirect effects through socio-economic status and media consumption indicate that singles hold more negative attitudes than couples. Public television consumption, popular online news consumption, and trust in media are positively related to attitudes, whereas commercial television consumption is negatively associated with them.

AbstractBelgium, and Europe in general, has seen a strong increase in the number of refugees arriving over the past three years. At the same time we also note an increasing polarization of Belgian public opinion on this subject. Among the main actors to shape this public opinion are news media, as they contribute to or combat stereotyping of (sub)groups in the population. The purpose of the current study is to analyze to which extent media consumption and trust have an impact on public opinion on two minority groups – immigrants and refugees – in a representative sample of the Belgian adult population (n = 1500). We gathered data on Belgian news media consumption and trust, and attitudes on immigrants and refugees through an online questionnaire. The results indicate that Belgian adults hold more positive attitudes on immigrants than on refugees. The reading of quality online newspapers as well as high levels of trust in television and radio are correlated with a positive attitude towards both groups, whereas the consumption of commercial television and popular newspapers go along with a negative attitude. Fear of terrorism (negative relation) and a negative evaluation of media coverage of refugees (positive relation) also have a sizeable influence. In terms of regional differences within Belgium, we find that citizens in the Brussels Capital Region hold more positive attitudes towards both groups than those in Flanders and Wallonia.