What Is Framing?

When first attempting to understand media bias, one must understand one key concept: media bias isn't purely lying.

When first attempting to understand media bias, one must understand one key concept: media bias isn't purely lying. Most articles that spread misinformation are easy to spot; many fact-checkers can analyze and easily find misinformation quickly. Framing is harder to catch, as typically the information is correct and sourced well, but the way it's presented is designed to shape your opinions.

Robert Entman, a Professor of Media and Public Affairs at George Washington University, says it best. He offers a definition that breaks down framing, writing:

"To frame is to select some aspects of a perceived reality and make them more salient in a communicating text, in such a way as to promote a particular problem definition, causal interpretation, moral evaluation and/or treatment recommendation for the item described." — Entman, 1993, p. 52

Selection and Salience

Allow me to go into a little more detail on how both of these mechanisms function. The first aspect of framing is selection, which is the concrete information the producer of an article chooses to use in their work. Think sourcing, statistics, and other forms of hard evidence.

The second mechanism of framing is salience, which is the content that is emphasized in an article. Salience is often achieved through the use of emotional and repetitive language, aiming to leave the audience with a particular opinion.

Framing matters far more than most people realize. You can read a story or listen to a podcast with 100% accurate information, and still walk away with an interpretation designed to shape your opinion. It's important to understand how framing shapes public opinion, which you can read more about on the next tab.

How Does Framing Shape Public Opinion?

Two outlets cover the same war. Two completely different stories.

One of the easiest ways to understand how framing works is to see it in action. Perhaps the easiest way to spot framing is through headlining, the design of an article's or video's attention-grabbing title. Take some news stories about the Russia-Ukraine conflict. On February 24, 2022, Russia launched an attack on Ukrainian soil. Soon after the attack, news outlets started reporting.

First came Al Jazeera's article right before noon. Al Jazeera, a left-leaning media network founded and operated by the Qatari government, released a story titled, "Russian forces launch full-scale invasion of Ukraine" (Al Jazeera, 2022). Later that evening, Russian state-sponsored news outlet RT released an article of its own, titled, "Putin announces 'special operation' in Donbass" (RT, 2022). Although these articles describe the same event, the stories they tell from just the headlines are entirely different.

Al Jazeera's headline uses language like "full-scale" and "invasion" to make the attack sound large and merciless. The article also generalizes the location, only saying the invasion was in Ukraine, which makes it seem like an attack on the entire country, rather than a city or region. RT's article, while reporting the same information, is on the opposite side in terms of wording. The use of "special operation" narrows the scale of the attack, making it sound more surgical and precise. Also, providing the specific location of Donbass makes the attack sound much more contained.

For someone just scrolling through articles, two starkly different realities are presented in under 10 words. Authors use just a few simple methods to accomplish this.

The Three Tools

First is word choice. As we saw with "invasion" and "operation," many authors substitute words to match their agenda. Some other common substitutions include "casualties" for "murdered" or "regime" for "government".

Second, many journalists use various emotional tones to elicit responses from their readers. This can be accomplished with words of fear or outrage, as well as visuals depicting emotional scenes or destruction.

Lastly, the sourcing of an article can play a legitimate role in the shaping of a story. Authors may include flawed studies, biased polls, and cherry-picked quotes to disguise bias in their stories.

This becomes more important as we take in the whole picture. Agenda-setting tells us a lot more about where the articles we read or podcasts we listen to come from, before the story is even written.

Agenda-Setting: What Controls What You Think About?

Framing is what happens after a story is written. Agenda-setting happens far before the story even exists.

Let's zoom out. Framing is what happens after a story or article is written. Agenda-setting happens far before the story even exists.

In 1968, researchers Maxwell McCombs and Donald Shaw conducted a research study on undecided voters in North Carolina (McCombs & Shaw, 1972). The research found that the policies voters cared most about closely correlated with what local and national media focused their reporting on. It's important to recognize that the media didn't necessarily influence voters' opinions but rather determined which issues were worth having an opinion on in the first place.

This phenomenon became known as agenda-setting: the media may not tell you exactly what to think, but it has incredible power over what you think about. This is more important than you may think. If news outlets collectively decide to report on certain topics while ignoring current events that could influence elections, voters can't accurately assess the full political landscape.

The Demographic Divide

There are even greater implications for certain demographics of voters. In modern America, citizens get their news from various sources, each using different forms of agenda-setting. For example, the Baby Boomer and Silent Generations are most likely to be the largest demographic among cable news watchers, compared with other younger generations (Pew Research Center, 2025). Don't think that cable news outlets aren't aware of this, either. Teams of researchers and editors carefully tailor their story selection to maximize viewership from their target demographic.

For younger generations, it's different, and perhaps even worse. A majority of the younger generation is no longer watching cable news and opting for social media or podcasts for their news (Pew Research Center, 2025).

The next tab looks at how modern platforms you may use every day go beyond traditional media bias, enhanced by algorithms.

The Echo Chamber You Live In

Old media used editors. New media uses algorithms.

According to the Pew Research Center, 76% of adults ages 18-29 get their news from social media (Pew Research Center, 2025). This represents America's shift from traditional cable news platforms to a social media environment characterized by high-speed, engaging, and interactive posts. The media Americans once consumed was carefully selected by journalists weighing mass public opinion; now it's being selected by a recommendation system optimized to keep you online.

How the Algorithm Works

Researchers Yuting Gao, Fei Liu, and Lei Gao dive deeper into how these algorithms work. They conducted a study across several short-form video platforms, including TikTok, to understand how these apps determine which videos you watch. They found that these social media platforms use aggressive algorithmic curation that carefully analyzes every interaction you have with the site to drive users towards unvarying content environments. They described these environments as echo chambers, where opposing views rarely surface (Gao et al., 2023).

These echo chambers have a dangerous implication on American sovereignty. The algorithm puts you into a custom group on the app, and continuously serves you information that matches your perceived beliefs. Over time, the recommendation feed narrows, and disagreement and political discussion disappear. The political beliefs of each group are reinforced over and over again, which can lead to misinformation and even political radicalization.

Speed Makes It Worse

A 30-second TikTok video doesn't leave any room for nuance, sourcing information, or counterargument. A short format rewards confidence and shock factors. By the time a viewer watches one video on a given topic or opinion, the next has already loaded below it. The ultimate effect is a society whose views are shaped more by likes rather than what's true.

Not all hope is lost, however, and you can be part of the fight against media bias. In the next tab, we will set you up with the tools you need to remain vigilant.

Your Bias Survival Kit

Being able to spot bias is absolutely vital in an era of intense algorithmic manipulation. Here are some tools you can use the next time you read a news article or listen to a podcast.

1. 01

   Read laterally, not vertically.

   Stanford Researchers Sam Wineburg and Sarah McGrew studied how different groups of people evaluated the validity of information on unfamiliar news sources. These groups included professional fact-checkers, historians, and college students. The researchers found that the fact-checkers were significantly faster and more accurate at spotting misinformation than the other groups. The reasoning is simple: instead of reading through an entire page and analyzing what it is saying through its lens, the fact-checkers immediately opened new tabs to find more background information about the publisher (Wineburg & McGrew, 2019). Before you immediately trust a source, always make sure to check the background of the person who wrote it. This technique is called lateral reading.

2. 02

   Compare headlines.

   Recall the RT and Al Jazeera examples from the "How Does Framing Shape Public Opinion?" tab. The drastic differences in headlines aren't just a one-off occurrence; any major story that is covered by news outlets will have significant differences between their headlines. Certain sites compile headlines from different news sources and compare their political bias. For example, Ground News is a platform that compiles stories about a specific topic from various outlets. It assigns each outlet a political bias rating from a third-party organization called AllSides, and allows you to know the politics of each news outlet you are reading. These can be vital for understanding an article's context.

3. 03

   Understand the emotions.

   Recall Entman's definition of framing from the "What is Framing?" tab. Framing works by making certain aspects of a story more salient. Strong emotion is one of the primary ways salience functions. If a headline or video triggers an immediate reaction, that means the author's framing worked. Remember to remain level-headed and understand that the author wants you to react in a specific way.

4. 04

   Use visual bias indicators when available.

   Researchers Timo Spinde and colleagues tested whether visual annotations, including warning labels and inline highlights of biased phrases, helped readers detect bias. Participants who were provided with this visual aid were able to identify framing significantly more accurately than those reading text without it (Spinde et al., 2022). Modern forms of these visual aids can be found in browser extensions and bias-rating tools that use AI to flag potentially biased language.

5. 05

   Diversify your news.

   Recall the echo chambers in "The Echo Chamber You Live In" tab. Algorithms limit your information by narrowing your perspective by default. The natural way to combat this is to deliberately push outside of what you are recommended. This means reading articles or listening to podcasts from news sources that don't necessarily match your political views. This can combat some forms of bias, and offer you a way to broaden your perspective. This is likely the easiest and most effective way to get the full picture of current events.

Glossary

A quick reference for the key terms used throughout this campaign.

Sources

All works cited throughout this campaign, formatted in APA 7th edition.