Whether at the Mexico border, in the Mediterranean, or the English Channel, images of migration are seldom anything but emotive.  As research from the University of Gothenburg explains, this coverage plays a huge role in our perceptions of immigration and of immigrants.

While this influence is fairly well established, the researchers argue that previously we have been limited to an understanding of HOW and WHEN they influenced people.  The authors tried to establish a richer perspective via a study conducted across Spain, Sweden, Hungary, Poland, Germany, and the UK, which were chosen due in part to the very different attitudes towards migration in each country.

Traditional and alternative media

In Sweden, for instance, the researchers found that traditional news media didn’t appear to influence people one way or another, even when the research was conducted at a time when a large number of refugees came to Sweden.

When media had a more pronounced political orientation, however, they were found to be far more influential.  For instance, those people who consumed content from the alt-right Avplixlat (now Samhällsnytt) were most negative about immigration, especially from outside the EU.  On the other hand, those who followed the left-leaning ETC became more positive.

“You need to be aware of this difference when talking about public opinion—and the influence of the media—in migration issues, especially since media with a clear political, especially immigration-critical, profile have increasingly established themselves as sources of information in many Western democracies,” the researchers say.

An emotive topic

The researchers then conducted an experiment featuring over 5,500 people, where they consumed both positive and negative articles about immigration and immigrants.  The articles were designed to arouse different feelings in the participants.

Understandably, the different ways in which the issue was framed influenced the reactions people had, with a more positive framing producing reduced negative emotions, which led to more positive attitudes among the volunteers.  Similarly, when people read negative articles, their positive emotions declined and negative attitudes increased.

“Emotions seem to be an important mechanism and can function as so-called mediating variables or factors that explain why people are influenced by the media’s representations of immigration,” the researchers say.

International variance

The study also found that the media differs in each country in terms of the way in which they try to trigger people’s perceptions of immigration as a threat, whether to the native culture, its economy, or to national security.  This depends to a large extent on the origins of the migrants.

For instance, immigrants from outside Europe were typically portrayed as a threat to the culture of a country, whereas immigration from within Europe was usually portrayed in more economic terms.

“But the results differ so much between the countries that it is not possible to talk about any universal influence or common patterns,” the researchers say.

Interestingly, however, the authors argue that the effect of the media was generally more limited than they expected, which they ascribe to the fact that many people had already formed their opinion on migration, which was then difficult to change regardless of the news content they consumed.