Framing

Eran N. Ben-Porath

Framing is a concept that refers to the selection of words, topics, and ideas in communication and the effects of these selections on public opinion. The term itself is a metaphor, suggesting that media messages, such as news stories, are bounded by practices of inclusion (what's inside the frame) and exclusion (that which we do not see). Communications researcher Robert Entman wrote in 1993 that “[t]o frame is to select some aspects of a perceived reality and make them more salient in a communication text, in such a way as to promote a particular problem definition, causal interpretation moral evaluation and/or treatment recommendation.” This straightforward definition locates the act of framing in the newsroom, but the theory of framing is also rooted in psychology, where the focus of study is on how individuals interpret reality differently, in part as a result of media frames. Framing research therefore spans several disciplines ...

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