Media's reporting on gun violence does not reflect reality, study finds

https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2020-10/uops-mro101920.php

News Release 19-Oct-2020
University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine

A new study, led by the doctors who regularly treat gunshot victims, examined the way the media covers shootings and found that news reports place a disproportionate emphasis on fatal and multiple shootings, while also focusing on uncommon victims, such as women. The researchers fear that the gap between what is covered - and what goes uncovered - in the news could be painting an unrealistic picture of gun violence, which might affect the way the public perceives it. The study was published today in the journal Preventive Medicine.

"As a trauma surgeon, and someone who feels very connected to my patients, I take notice of gun violence coverage in the news--most often the lack thereof. I am particularly saddened when I find there was no media reporting on the shootings that have caused injury and death to my patients, which is most often the case," said the study's lead author, Elinore Kaufman, MD, an assistant professor of Surgery in Traumatology in the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. "While I was not surprised to see data on under-reporting in the media, I was startled to see how much it varied related to victim characteristics."


•••••

Disparities in news coverage continued when the deadliness of the shootings was examined. Although 16 percent of the victims from the analyzed shootings died, these fatal shootings accounted for 83 percent of the cases covered by the news.

"A vast majority of the victims of gun violence survive, but I don't think the public knows much about people whose lives have been disrupted in so many ways by their injuries, and who need all our support to recover," Kaufman said. "I like to think that more public awareness of the impact of gun violence on survivors would lead to broader support for the services and programs that they need."

Statistics have shown that one in four Americans perceive mass shootings to be the greatest gun violence threat facing their communities, but the study showed that shootings with multiple victims occurred just 22 percent of the time. However, mass shootings were almost six times as likely to make the news.

•••••