Framing the Crisis: An Analysis of Turkish News Coverage of COVID-19

The global spread of COVID-19 has also got a wide media coverage due to its high rate of mortality and infections. Mass media serve a key role in providing information and making the general population aware of the situation during crises and the coverage of crises have attracted much attention in the field of media and communication studies. This study, employing the framing theory as the theoretical framework, compared the Turkish online media’s coverage of COVID-19 over two time spans from February 26 to March 10, 2020 and from March 11 to March 26, 2020. The first case of COVID-19 was reported in Turkey on March 11, 2020 and this study focused on how online media framed the epidemic and to what extent framing of COVID-19 differed over two time spans. Findings revealed that two time spans demonstrated considerable differences in crisis coverage. Considering frames across time, most often used ones were reassurance and economic consequences. They were followed by health severity and action frames. Human interest and leadership were used least often in crisis coverage. The independent samples t test conducted to examine the differences across time demonstrated that periods are effective variables on the online coverage of the outbreak.

Anahtar Kelimeler: COVID-19, framing, crisis, online news

The global spread of COVID-19 has also got a wide media coverage due to its high rate of mortality and infections. Mass media serve a key role in providing information and making the general population aware of the situation during crises and the coverage of crises have attracted much attention in the field of media and communication studies. This study, employing the framing theory as the theoretical framework, compared the Turkish online media’s coverage of COVID-19 over two time spans from February 26 to March 10, 2020 and from March 11 to March 26, 2020. The first case of COVID-19 was reported in Turkey on March 11, 2020 and this study focused on how online media framed the epidemic and to what extent framing of COVID-19 differed over two time spans. Findings revealed that two time spans demonstrated considerable differences in crisis coverage. Considering frames across time, most often used ones were reassurance and economic consequences. They were followed by health severity and action frames. Human interest and leadership were used least often in crisis coverage. The independent samples t test conducted to examine the differences across time demonstrated that periods are effective variables on the online coverage of the outbreak.

Keywords: COVID-19, framing, crisis, online news