“We’re all traumatized”: Journalists’ perceptions of how COVID-19 affected local American TV reporters’ presentation of news stories and their relationships with the public

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic challenged traditional journalistic norms of objectivity and neutrality and existing reporting practices for local American television news. Reporters operated in a rapidly changing environment fraught with fear, misinformation, personal health and safety issues, and political polarization. Using framing as the theoretical framework of their study, researchers conducted in-depth interviews during summer 2021 with 20 local American television reporters about their employment experiences during the pandemic. Thematic analysis revealed journalists faced increased distrust, harassment, and assaults from the public during the pandemic. Reporters also struggled with employing the traditional American journalistic norms of objectivity during the health crisis and were divided on how they handled reporting misinformation.