Effects of Linguistic Abstractness in the Mass Media

Geschke, Daniel; Sassenberg, Kai; Ruhrmann, Georg; Sommer, Denise

doi:10.1027/1864-1105/a000014

Cited by 47 publications

(21 citation statements)

References 17 publications

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“…However, this trend did not reach the conventional level of significance. Nevertheless, since previous research has shown that the effects of linguistic abstractness are subtle and difficult to detect in heterogeneous samples (Geschke, Sassenberg, Ruhrmann, & Sommer, 2010;Graf et al, 2012), we found this preliminary observation encouraging for further investigation.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 61%

Language of Responsibility. The Influence of Linguistic Abstraction on Collective Moral Emotions

Bilewicz

Stefaniak

Witkowska

et al. 2017

Psychology of Language and Communication

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Two experiments investigated the effects of linguistic abstractness on the experience of collective moral emotions. In Experiment 1 participants were presented with two scenarios about ingroup misbehavior, phrased using descriptive action verbs, interpretative action verbs, adjectives or nouns. The results show that participants experienced slightly more negative moral emotions with higher levels of linguistic abstractness. In Experiment 2 we also tested for the influence of national identification on the relationship between linguistic abstractness and emotional reactions. Additionally, we expanded the number of scenarios. Experiment 2 replicated the earlier pattern, but found larger differences between conditions. The strength of national identification did not moderate the observed effects. The results of this research are discussed within the context of the linguistic category model and psychology of collective moral emotions.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 61%

Language of Responsibility. The Influence of Linguistic Abstraction on Collective Moral Emotions

Bilewicz

Stefaniak

Witkowska

et al. 2017

Psychology of Language and Communication

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“…When the news story suggested that immigration produces crime and a breakdown in law and order, the resulting receiver's language was characterized by greater negative affective language and higher abstraction, both characteristics associated with prejudice (Geschke et al, 2010).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Language use depending on news frame and immigrant origin

Sedano¹,

Perosanz

Moral

et al. 2012

Int J Psychol

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The purpose of this study was to analyze the effect of the media on individuals' specific language use in relation to a news story on immigration: the influence of the news frame and group cue. Abstraction, complexity of language use, and negative affective language were evaluated. The 523 participants were randomly distributed to each of the four experimental conditions: news frame (crime versus economic contribution) by group cue (geographical origin of the immigrants involved: Moroccans versus Latin Americans). Through content analysis of the ideas and reflections that arose after the participants read the different news stories, using the Linguistic Category Model (LCM; Semin & Fiedler, 1991) to measure abstract language and the Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC; Pennebaker, Booth, & Francis, 2007) to analyze complex language and negative affective language, it emerged that abstract language and negative affective language were more frequent in the participants assigned to the news frame on crime. Complex language was more commonly used when the news frame referred to the economic contribution of immigrants. Regression analyses showed the mediating role of attitude to immigration in the effects of news frame on negative affective language. The bootstrap method was used to assess the magnitude of the indirect effect. A significant mediator effect was also found through structural equation modeling. Analyses of covariance showed one interaction between news frame and group cue: Among those who read the news story in a frame linking immigration to crime and Moroccan origin, abstract language was more characteristic. The results are discussed from the theoretical perspective of framing.

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“…Reuters news includes both positive topics such as sports and business, and negative topics such as war and crime, and possibly, the topics are more important predictors of valence than pronouns are; hence large effect sizes were not expected in this material. However, people are soaked in news from different media throughout the day, and given this massive exposure and constant repetition, small and subtle evaluative differences are likely to have implications for how people construe their social world (Collins 2011;Geschke et al 2010). …”

Section: Limitations and Future Directionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“She” and “He” in News Media Messages: Pronoun Use Reflects Gender Biases in Semantic Contexts

2014

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Previous research has shown a male bias in the media. This study tests this statement by examining how the pronouns She and He are used in a news media context. More specifically, the study tests whether He occurs more often and in more positive semantic contexts than She, as well as whether She is associated with more stereotypically and essential labels than He is. Latent semantic analysis (LSA) was applied to 400 000 Reuters' news messages, written in English, published in 1996-1997. LSA is a completely data-driven method, extracting statistics of words from how they are used throughout a corpus. As such, no human coders are involved in the assessment of how pronouns occur in their contexts. The results showed that He pronouns were about 9 times more frequent than She pronouns. In addition, the semantic contexts of He were more positive than the contexts of She. Moreover, words associated with She-contexts included more words denoting gender, and were more homogeneous than the words associated with He-contexts. Altogether, these results indicate that men are represented as the norm in these media. Since these news messages are distributed on a daily basis all over the world, in printed newspapers, and on the internet, it seems likely that this presentation maintains, and reinforces prevalent gender stereotypes, hence contributing to gender inequities.

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Effects of Linguistic Abstractness in the Mass Media

Cited by 47 publications

References 17 publications

Language of Responsibility. The Influence of Linguistic Abstraction on Collective Moral Emotions

Language of Responsibility. The Influence of Linguistic Abstraction on Collective Moral Emotions

Language use depending on news frame and immigrant origin

“She” and “He” in News Media Messages: Pronoun Use Reflects Gender Biases in Semantic Contexts

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