Framing

As a mass communication theory, framing describes the active process of creating, selecting, and shaping aspects of reality in communicative texts. The results of this dynamic activity are called frames. This entry first examines the ways in which framing has been defined and goes on to trace its theoretical roots in various disciplines and identify the core processes and underlying paradigms in framing. Next, the early works that shaped the field of study are reviewed and subsequent research explored. The entry concludes with a brief discussion of the ways in which scholars have critiqued the concept of framing and argued for new approaches to the field.

To paraphrase a landmark 1993 definition by scholar Robert Entman, frames perform a variety of tasks, such as defining social problems and their causes, emphasizing certain moral judgments, and promoting particular solutions or policy decisions. Since its inception in the early 1970s, framing has become an oft-used theoretical framework in the study of journalism and mass communication and one of the most utilized mass communication theories of the present era. As sociologist Gaye Tuchman (1943–) explained in her book Making News, the framing metaphor suggests that news functions as a window through which audiences learn about the world outside. But such frames are problematic—like any window, the view afforded depends on the size and [Page 684]construction of the frame as well as the viewer’s vantage point in relation to the frame.

Framing has theoretical roots in several fields, including mass communication, sociology, political science, and psychology. As a social scientific theory, framing functions as a bridge among diverse perspectives and across disparate research paradigms, from empirical-positivist-quantitative studies to critical-interpretive-qualitative work. Framing is lauded for its versatility in crossing these intellectual divides. Furthermore, framing is a term that is used in everyday speech in ways that resemble its theoretical use, lending the concept a degree of face validity.

Framing’s theoretical utility stems from the notion that frames exist at all levels of the communication process. The individuals creating content bring their own mental frames (or schemata) to the table. The professional norms and routines of the journalism industry—such as the emphasis on conflict and timeliness—manifest themselves in media frames. Elites and social movements are influential frame promoters who battle to establish the dominant framing of an issue, and the political and cultural contexts of a society are reflected in these dominant news frames. Finally, the audiences who consume content carry their own frames, which may be reinforced, challenged, or changed through their exposure to frames in media content.

In 1999, Dietram A. Scheufele explicated four core underlying processes that encompass framing: the frame building activities undertaken by influential parties who hope to shape media discourse; the frame setting effects that stem from the interaction between journalist frames and the audience; the individual-level processes involved in audience-level comprehension of frames; and, finally, the interpretive feedback loop that results from the fact that journalists are also audience members embedded in the same culture as the rest of the audience. When considered across those distinct processes, framing’s greatest potential is to illuminate a holistic picture of public opinion formation and change—from the antecedents of content, through the conditions that influence characteristics of content itself, to the effects of content on the public.

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