No compassion for Muslims?
- Author(s)
- Desiree Schmuck, Jörg Matthes, Christian von Sikorski
- Abstract
Islamist terrorist attacks have become a salient threat to Western countries, and news coverage about such crimes is a key predictor of public emotional reactions and policy support. We examine the effects of two key characteristics of terrorism news coverage: (1) the victim’s religion and (2) first-person narratives that facilitate perspective taking. A quota-based experiment (N = 354) revealed that irrespective of the narrative type, news reports that mention the victims’ Muslim religion induce less anger and compassion, but more joy among non-Muslim news consumers. However, fear was equally induced by all news articles. As a consequence, fear, anger, and joy predicted support for more restrictive terrorism policies, while anger and compassion were related to more support for victim compensation.
- Organisation(s)
- Department of Communication
- External organisation(s)
- Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Universität Koblenz-Landau
- Journal
- Crime & Delinquency
- Volume
- 69
- Pages
- 1020-1043
- No. of pages
- 24
- ISSN
- 0011-1287
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1177/00111287211000626
- Publication date
- 03-2021
- Peer reviewed
- Yes
- Austrian Fields of Science 2012
- 508007 Communication science, 508014 Journalism
- Keywords
- ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Law, Pathology and Forensic Medicine
- Sustainable Development Goals
- SDG 16 - Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions
- Portal url
- https://ucris.univie.ac.at/portal/en/publications/no-compassion-for-muslims(e748e6fe-843f-4580-9d38-fd884a80ce7c).html