When 'Balance' Is Bias - Global Warming Coverage
Top U.S. newspapers' focus on balance skewed coverage of global warming, analysis reveals
SANTA CRUZ, CA--Reporters and editors at four of the nation's top newspapers adhered to the journalistic norm of balance at the expense of accurately reporting scientific understanding of the human contributions to global warming, according to an analysis that appears in the current issue of the journal Global Environmental Change.
The new study, "Balance as Bias: Global Warming and the U.S. Prestige Press," examined coverage of human contributions to global warming in the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, and the Wall Street Journal from 1988 to 2002 to assess how scientific findings were conveyed to readers.
"By giving equal time to opposing views, these newspapers significantly downplayed scientific understanding of the role humans play in global warming," said researcher Maxwell T. Boykoff, a doctoral candidate in environmental studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz, who coauthored the paper with his brother, Jules M. Boykoff, a visiting assistant professor of politics at Whitman College.
"We respect the need to represent multiple viewpoints, but when generally agreed-upon scientific findings are presented side-by-side with the viewpoints of a handful of skeptics, readers are poorly served," added Boykoff. "In this case, it contributed to public confusion and opened the door to political maneuvering."
In a thorough analysis of 636 articles, the Boykoffs found that:
- 52.7 percent gave "roughly equal attention" to the views that humans contribute to global warming and that climate change is exclusively the result of natural fluctuations.
- 35.3 percent emphasized the role of humans while presenting both sides of the debate, which the Boykoffs said more accurately reflected scientific thinking about global warming.
- 6.2 percent emphasized the dubious nature of the claim that anthropogenic global warming exists.
- 5.8 percent contained exclusive coverage of human contributions to Earth's temperature increases.
Although some media analysts assert that coverage improved as scientific understanding grew, the study suggests otherwise. Recognizing the challenges of characterizing the views of the scientific community on a controversial topic, the Boykoffs focused on the findings of groups like the United Nations-sponsored Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which was created in 1988. The scientific community reached general consensus by late 1990 that immediate action should be taken to combat global warming, yet media coverage lagged through 2001, according to the Boykoffs.
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When 'Balance' Is Bias - Global Warming Coverage