Attitudes to migration and the market for news

Abstract

Do news outlets present the topic of migration in an overly positive or negative manner, or do they provide a neutral and holistic perspective on the topic? To study the visual bias of news media in the context of migration, we collect and code migration-related pictures that news outlets publish and – to establish a benchmark – compare them to the pictures that pro- and anti-migration ideological campaigns use in promotion materials. We find that, during the 2015-16 migration crisis, news outlets in Germany adopt differentiated attitudes to migration that largely follow their political orientation. For most news outlets, the attitude to migration is closer to pro- than to anti-migration campaigns. All news outlets except one tabloid newspaper maintain their attitude even when consumers become more critical of migration over time. Further, we conduct an international comparison and find that attitudes to migration are significantly more negative in the Hungarian than in the German market for news.