Framing Effects: A Fractured Paradigm

Shanto Iyengar

Prepared for 3rd International Summer School; University of Milan - Department of Social & Political Studies

What is Framing?

“… a dynamic, circumstantially-bound process of opinion formation in which the prevailing modes of presentation in elite rhetoric and news media coverage shape mass opinion….”

“Framing effects refer to behavioral or attitudinal outcomes that are not due to differences in what is being communicated, but rather to variations in how a given piece of information is being presented (or framed) in public discourse.”

Historical Perspective

Originally defined as a “presentation” effect in Tversky and Kahneman studies of gains/losses

People tended to be risk-seeking when asked to choose between a sure loss and a probabilistic loss, but risk-averse when the same choice was applied to gains

Imagine that the US is preparing for the outbreak of an unusual Asian disease, which is expected to kill 600 people.Two alternative programs to combat the disease have been proposed. Assume that the exact scientific estimates of the consequences of each program are as follows: If Program A is adopted, 200 people will be saved (72%)If Program B is adopted, there is a 1/3rd prob that 600 people will be saved, and a 2/3rds prob that no people will be saved (28%) If Program A . . . 400 people will die (22%)If Program B . . . there is a 1/3rd prob. that nobody will die and a 2/3rd prob that 600 will die (78%)

Equivalent Frames: Kahneman-Tversky Paradigm

Semi-Equivalent Media Frames

Communications researchers adapted the framing paradigm to news coverage – different “genres” of news coverage proposed as frames

Episodic versus Thematic Framing of Issues

Episodic framing the dominant form of broadcast news coverage – issues depicted as particular instances: homeless person, single mother, laid off worker as symptomatic of poverty, particular criminal acts instead of overall trends in the level of crime (Iyengar, 1991)

Thematic framing embeds issues in some general or societal context – historical trends in unemployment or poverty; news accompanied by expert analysis

Effects of issue framing on attributions of responsibility Episodic framing dispositional attributions

(“blaming the victim”) Thematic framing societal or structural

attributions

Framing as a Pattern or “Script” Scripts as narrative structures; the crime script

in local news – violent crime > non-violent crime (Iyengar & Gilliam, 1999)

Accompanied by visual cues suggesting race or ethnicity of suspect

Race of Suspect Manipulation

Recall of Suspect’s Race in Gilliam/Iyengar Crime Study

Impact of Crime Script

People become more concerned about crime

People become more “punitive” in their crime policy preferences

“Issue” Frames

Alternative perspectives on policy problems; immigration as a law enforcement or economic growth issue (Nelson, 1997)

Issue frames are “emphasis” rather than “equivalence” frames; this is the crux of the problem with current research

Competitive Frames In real world, parties and politicians engage in

strategic framing (“heresthetics”) of issues making it inevitable that voters are exposed simultaneously to multiple frames

Chong & Druckman (2008, 2009) on effects of exposure to multiple frames: under conditions of synchronous exposure (exposure at one point in time), the effects cancel out and participants fall back on general predispositions as opinion cues (also see Sniderman & Thereault, 2004)

Summary Communication researchers increasingly employ

operational definitions of the framing concept that embody considerable differences in content across frames (“emphasis” framing)

The original concept of framing as a presentation effect (“equivalence” framing) has largely been abandoned

The Problem with Emphasis Frames

“Emphasis-based frames not only vary the perspective or underlying dimension for considering an event (e.g. freedom of speech in the case of some particular dissenting group), but they also differ in several other respects, In one of the more precise emphasis framing studies, for instance (Druckman and Nelson, 2003), approximately fifty words were unique to each of the competing “free speech” and “special interest” frames.”

Non-Equivalence=Confounds

The lack of equivalent content means that any effects of exposure to the frame cannot be attributed to presentation per se

More likely, effects reflect significant differences in content

Therefore, emphasis frames represent messages; framing effects are no different from persuasion effects

The Advantages of Visual Over Semantic Frames

It is time for framing research to move away from emphasis frames and towards equivalence frames

Non-verbal, visual cues provide ecologically valid equivalence frames

Racial and gender phenotypes as exemplars; visual representation of candidate’s ethnicity and gender as a form of framing

“It is possible to create alternative versions of a picture that differ along a specific dimension, but which remain identical on all other observable dimensions so that any variation in the audience response can be attributable only to the manipulated dimension.”

The Case of Afrocentrism

2008 Obama study – manipulated Afrocentrism (phenotype) relatively early and late in the campaign

Obama: 70-30 Eurocentric Morph

Obama: 70-30 Afrocentric Morph

Findings

In February, the more Afrocentric version of Obama elicited significantly less support from White voters

In October, however, the visual manipulation had no impact at all

Pattern suggests that facial cues are more important in races where candidates are little known

Immigration Study Appearance versus credentials in perceptions of

immigrants applying for citizenship (cultural versus economic threat)

Economic credentials defined according to occupational skill (professional versus manual laborer)

Cultural credentials defined according to nationality (Muslim/non-Muslim) and skin color/morphing manipulations applied to different ethnic groups represented in the immigrant pool

Politics of Immigration

Complexion Manipulation: Immigration Study

Rashid Siddiqui, applicant for work permit

Roberto Sanchez, applicant for work permit

Rajan Sivamurthy, applicant for work permit

Female Immigrants/Cultural Threat Manipulation

Gender Phenotypes

“Over the course of the last two decades, researchers in political communication have proposed a diverse and often incompatible set of conceptual definitions of framing. The resulting operational confusion surrounding the construct has made drawing broader inferences across different studies all but impossible.”

Summary

“We urge researchers to structure future empirical work around the original characteristics of the concept, i.e., variations in the mode of presentation of a given stimulus, rather than manipulations of the informational or persuasive nature of messages.”