Visual framing of climate change during natural disasters at home and abroad: an analysis of British news

Abstract

The connection between climate change and its consequences is often implicit for the general public. Moreover the public often perceives climate change as a phenomenon affecting distant regions and future generations rather than recognising its immediate repercussions. Media play a pivotal role in informing the public on climate change and its consequences including increased frequency and intensity of natural disasters. This research examines the visual frames employed by British news outlets during periods of natural disasters transpiring in the UK or globally. The aim of the research is to reveal the most common visual frames used whether nature is framed as a threat and whether psychologically distant visuals are used at times of natural disasters. The authors analyse 2413 images extracted from 907 climate change-related news articles from UK publications and media namely the The Guardian BBC and Daily Mail published during periods marked by natural disasters. They find that the natural environment is not visually framed as threatening despite the experience of natural disasters. Second they observe that the news stories mostly reduced psychological distance by using the person frames using a camera angle that creates empathy. However they also undermine this effect by not providing geographical details regarding origins of persons and location of the scenes depicted in the visuals. Furthermore significant differences exist in the frames utilised by different outlets that they analysed. This study demonstrates that the visuals used in news stories also tell a story about climate change and this story has a potential to reduce the perceived distance of climate change effects on the viewer offering ways to improve visual framing of climate change.