Publications by Danielle K Brown
Journalism Practice, 2019
Social Media + Society
This research investigates how personality strength, news engagement, and news consumption influe... more This research investigates how personality strength, news engagement, and news consumption influence engagement on Reddit, an environment that affords varying degrees of anonymity and is known to paradoxically host toxic and supportive communities. Using a survey of Redditors, findings suggest women are less likely to comment and post but are equally likely to vote and read posts as men, indicating there may be hesitation to engage in using more active participatory options within the site. Older users are more likely to comment and post when compared to younger users.
Journalism
The shooting death of Michael Brown by a police officer in August 2014 served as a pivotal case t... more The shooting death of Michael Brown by a police officer in August 2014 served as a pivotal case that pushed excessive use of police force against minority groups to the national spotlight. Guided by the scholarship on protest coverage, this article investigates the interplay between advocacy and journalistic framing in the coverage of the Ferguson protests by national and local news. A content analysis of five newspapers during the first cycle of protests identified how journalistic frames of presentation derived from the ‘protest paradigm’ literature related to the content frames pushed forward by the Black Lives Matter movement. Results reveal that initial stories were predominantly episodic and focused on violence to the detriment of demands and grievances. However, episodic stories were also critical of the police response and the use of military-grade weapons to contain the demonstrations. As the weeks progressed, journalists gave space to the ideas of protestors in a more them...
Social Media + Society
People who are affected by cancer can benefit greatly from social support and digital social netw... more People who are affected by cancer can benefit greatly from social support and digital social networks, though our understanding of online support is primarily founded in dominant platforms like Facebook. In addition, while previous scholarship indicates that social support is available online, little research has examined predictors of support provision. A content analysis was performed to examine the relationship between narrative features in Imgur posts and social support in comments. Imgur ( Imgur.com ) is a social media site and image-hosting platform, amassing over 250 million monthly visitors. Six post features were hypothesized to predict support, including explanations of the diagnosis experience, evidence of agentive problem solving, indications of positive reappraisal, pleads for the audience to get a checkup, references to mortality, and inclusion of humor. The results of this study indicate a relationship between narrative construction and social support, finding that th...
Mass Communication and Society
ABSTRACT This study tests the impact of protest news frames on audience support for a civil right... more ABSTRACT This study tests the impact of protest news frames on audience support for a civil rights movement. Using a 3 × 2 experimental design, we explored how frames and visuals affect audiences’ criticism of police and protesters, support for, and identification with the movement. Findings showed that articles with a legitimizing debate frame increased support for protesters, identification with protesters, and police criticism compared to articles with riot and confrontation frames. Riot and confrontation frames increase criticism toward protesters, decreased support for and identification with the movement, and decrease police criticism. We also considered predispositions toward Black people, the police, and social movements in general as essential to understanding support. Results revealed prior levels of support for the movement influenced criticism of police action and support for and identification with protestors more than media frames. As such, we argue that preexisting attitudes about actors in a news story are essential variables to consider in protest coverage effects research.
This article investigates the relationship between digital news coverage of protests and the audi... more This article investigates the relationship between digital news coverage of protests and the audience’s willingness to engage with a story about Black Lives Matter on social media. Using a 3x2 expe...
How do online news and social media use relate to public support for the European Union? To answe... more How do online news and social media use relate to public support for the European Union? To answer this question, this study compares the effect of institutional websites, news websites, online social networks, blogs, and video hosting websites on five important dimensions of public attitudes toward the EU: strengthening, performance, fear, efficacy, and utilitarianism. Cases were selected by choosing the samples from the largest country in each stage of EU enlargement: Germany, the United Kingdom, Greece, Sweden, the Czech Republic, and Romania. After controlling for demographic and political factors, results show that getting European news from blogs fosters negative attitudes toward the EU, whereas social network sites contribute to a positive view of the EU’s performance and support for further strengthening. In addition, the use of YouTube and news websites interacts with off-line discussion to enhance political effects.
Critiques of exclusively verbal research inquiries in media and communication studies are certain... more Critiques of exclusively verbal research inquiries in media and communication studies are certainly not new. While scholars have not shied away from noting the importance of visual analysis, a significant stream of empirical inquiries is still based on verbal data, reducing the exclusion of visuals to a limitation and an opportunity for future study. Notably, this limitation is not just a product of research scope. The ability to collect and process large quantities of visual data has also contributed to the general acceptance of these limitations. However, new data collection capacities afforded through technological advancements have helped dissolve some of the barriers visual data collection creates, and researchers are capable of simultaneously analyzing visual/verbal data sets now more than ever before.
Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, 2021
This content analysis expands protest paradigm research, examining the relationship between Faceb... more This content analysis expands protest paradigm research, examining the relationship between Facebook user engagement and newspaper protest coverage. Stories not posted to social media housed more negative frames that delegitimized protesters. For select protests, Facebook users engaged more with articles with legitimizing content, suggesting users, like journalists, follow a paradigm that legitimizes some protests and marginalizes others. We discuss these implications and consider how engagement plays a role in a protest’s ability to gain visibility and public support. Findings show the media and the public marginalize movements within a framework that rebuilds a hierarchy of social struggle on social media.
International Journal of Communication, 2019
Building on research analyses of Black Lives Matter media portrayals, this inquiry uses a two-wav... more Building on research analyses of Black Lives Matter media portrayals, this inquiry uses a two-wave panel survey to examine the effects news coverage has on the evaluation of the core ideas from the Black Lives Matter social movement agenda. Results show that conservative media use increases negative evaluations; models suggest this relationship works as a multidirectional feedback loop. Mainstream and liberal media consumptions do not lead to more positive views about Black Lives Matter’s core ideas.
Journalism Research That Matters, 2021
After the death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, mainstream newspaper coverage focused ext... more After the death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, mainstream newspaper coverage focused extensively on protesters actions and left little room for narratives that explore the demands, grievances, and agendas of the social movement to end police violence and save Black lives. Over time, coverage of Black Lives Matter protests remained problematic and publicly critiqued. This chapter uses a content analysis of newspaper coverage four years after the death of Michael Brown to reassess press coverage narratives that dominated the protests that followed the police killing of unarmed Stephon Clark in Sacramento, California. Digital newspaper coverage from national, large metropolitan and local papers was analyzed for six months after the March 20, 2018 shooting of Clark. Coverage was also tracked through public social media networks to look for narrative patterns in the most shared coverage.
Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 2021
ABSTRACT Analyzing news coverage of the killing of Stephon Clark in 2018, this research contribut... more ABSTRACT Analyzing news coverage of the killing of Stephon Clark in 2018, this research contributes to the further theorization of the hierarchy of social struggle by (1) confirming the consistent use of demonizing and delegitimizing framing devices to describe Black human rights protest, and (2) illustrating that the quality of the presentation of grievances and demands must also be considered when assessing the degree to which coverage can be legitimizing for a racial justice movement. In addition, findings show selective social media sharing amplified the limited coverage about police character but amplified sensational reports of injury.
Television and New Media, 2021
Since the U.S. 2016 presidential election, journalists and news organizations have been forced to... more Since the U.S. 2016 presidential election, journalists and news organizations have been forced to confront shifting racial, social and political climates, and re-evaluate practices and norms. However, news coverage of racism is complex, especially because the conceptualization of racism in society is discordant, and the parameters of racism are heavily debated. News coverage can contribute to this debatability, specifically when it presents issues of racism with certain linguistic and topical features. In a content analysis of social media posts from six of the Facebook pages maintained by national broadcast and newspaper organizations, the present study explores contextual and linguistic representations of racism, and how social media users on Facebook engage with news posted by these organizations. Results suggest representations in news coverage signal a public debate about what is and is not racism. Coverage heavily emphasized prominent figures, while social media audiences amplified Trump’s presence in social networks.
Journalism, 2020
Protest paradigm researchers theorize that protests are delegitimized in news coverage
because of... more Protest paradigm researchers theorize that protests are delegitimized in news coverage
because of journalistic culture and practices. This study explores the degree to
which norms, routines, values and perceptions explain coverage patterns of protest.
This mixed-methods study utilizes self-reflections from a survey of US journalists
in four regions, alongside a content analysis of their coverage. Our study highlights
how objective-observer role conceptions, routines driven by newsworthiness, and
a perception-performance gap help explain protest coverage patterns. Importantly,
journalists believed they did a better job covering protests than the content analysis
showed, raising questions about what protest coverage should look like.
Journal of Health Communication, 2020
In times of health crisis, news media have generally contributed to public panic, though these in... more In times of health crisis, news media have generally contributed to public panic, though these instances are usually explored in crises involving communicable diseases. However, in 2017, the long-brewing opioid crisis was formally declared a federal emergency by the United States government, leading to a considerable uptick in media attention to drugs and drug addiction. Considering 1) the news media’s tendency to contribute to public fear and panic during times of emergency or crisis, 2) the problematic representations of drug addiction in previous years, and 3) developing social media production practices among journalists on social media, this research uses content analysis to explore how highly circulated news outlets covered drug addiction in 2017–2018 and social media audiences’ emotional responses. Results indicate that political intervention drove media coverage rather than the effects of opioid addiction on people. Political interference led to increased anger and laughter reactions among Facebook users.
International Journal of Press/Politics
News coverage is fundamental to a protest's viability, but research suggests media negatively por... more News coverage is fundamental to a protest's viability, but research suggests media negatively portray protests and protesters that challenge the status quo (a pattern known as the protest paradigm). This study questions the validity of those claims within the context of digital newspaper coverage, interrogating how topic and region shape coverage. Using a content analysis of coverage from sixteen newspapers in various U.S. market types and regions, this research examines framing and sourcing features in articles about protests. Results suggest media coverage of protests centered on racial issues (discrimination of Indigenous people and anti-Black racism) follows more of a delegitimizing pattern than stories about protests related to immigrants' rights, health, and environment. A model to understand news coverage of protest based on a hierarchy of social struggle is proposed.
Social Media + Society, 2019
This research investigates how personality strength, news engagement, and news consumption influe... more This research investigates how personality strength, news engagement, and news consumption influence engagement on
Reddit, an environment that affords varying degrees of anonymity and is known to paradoxically host toxic and supportive
communities. Using a survey of Redditors, findings suggest women are less likely to comment and post but are equally likely
to vote and read posts as men, indicating there may be hesitation to engage in using more active participatory options within
the site. Older users are more likely to comment and post when compared to younger users.
International Journal of Communication , 2019
Building on research analyses of Black Lives Matter media portrayals, this inquiry uses a two-wav... more Building on research analyses of Black Lives Matter media portrayals, this inquiry uses a two-wave panel survey to examine the effects news coverage has on the evaluation of the core ideas from the Black Lives Matter social movement agenda. Results show that conservative media use increases negative evaluations; models suggest this relationship works as a multidirectional feedback loop. Mainstream and liberal media consumptions do not lead to more positive views about Black Lives Matter's core ideas.
This study identifies how audiences use nonverbal cues to judge specific character traits in poli... more This study identifies how audiences use nonverbal cues to judge specific character traits in political figures. Participants assessed pictures that showed the example politician making eye contact with another person with highest scores. His hand positions received the lowest character-trait scores. Findings show that participants associated direct eye contact and smiling with characteristics such as intelligence, good leadership, and caring, but not morality or honesty. In fact, no nonverbal cue affected evaluations of morality. However, those who judged the candidate as moral from nonverbal cues had a greater likelihood of voting for him.
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Publications by Danielle K Brown
because of journalistic culture and practices. This study explores the degree to
which norms, routines, values and perceptions explain coverage patterns of protest.
This mixed-methods study utilizes self-reflections from a survey of US journalists
in four regions, alongside a content analysis of their coverage. Our study highlights
how objective-observer role conceptions, routines driven by newsworthiness, and
a perception-performance gap help explain protest coverage patterns. Importantly,
journalists believed they did a better job covering protests than the content analysis
showed, raising questions about what protest coverage should look like.
Reddit, an environment that affords varying degrees of anonymity and is known to paradoxically host toxic and supportive
communities. Using a survey of Redditors, findings suggest women are less likely to comment and post but are equally likely
to vote and read posts as men, indicating there may be hesitation to engage in using more active participatory options within
the site. Older users are more likely to comment and post when compared to younger users.
because of journalistic culture and practices. This study explores the degree to
which norms, routines, values and perceptions explain coverage patterns of protest.
This mixed-methods study utilizes self-reflections from a survey of US journalists
in four regions, alongside a content analysis of their coverage. Our study highlights
how objective-observer role conceptions, routines driven by newsworthiness, and
a perception-performance gap help explain protest coverage patterns. Importantly,
journalists believed they did a better job covering protests than the content analysis
showed, raising questions about what protest coverage should look like.
Reddit, an environment that affords varying degrees of anonymity and is known to paradoxically host toxic and supportive
communities. Using a survey of Redditors, findings suggest women are less likely to comment and post but are equally likely
to vote and read posts as men, indicating there may be hesitation to engage in using more active participatory options within
the site. Older users are more likely to comment and post when compared to younger users.