The Influence of Media on Public Perception of Crime

In modern media coverage, social media, mainstream news outlets, and television entertainment play pivotal roles in shaping public perceptions of crime. Such media representations can significantly sway public views on the prevalence, nature, and severity of crime in their local communities and at a national level. These representations can also shape opinions about the fairness of the criminal justice system and the need for reform. Modern criminal justice classes now include media literacy components to help future professionals understand and address these biased representations of crime in various media outlets.

In this article, we will explore some of the current trends prevalent in the United States, such as the overreporting of certain types of crimes on social media and biased portrayals of the criminal justice system in the news and entertainment media. We will also explore how these trends directly influence individual perceptions of crime and their broader implications for societal attitudes and policies related to crime.

Overrepresentation of crime in the news

Each media platform plays a distinct role in shaping how the public views crime. However, combined, they undoubtedly reinforce the public perception that criminal activity is a more significant and imminent threat in the United States than is justified by publicly available crime data.

Social media platforms like Facebook often over-report certain types of crimes. Specifically, crimes involving black suspects tend to be more prominent and shared more frequently on these platforms, creating a skewed view of race and crime. A recent study by Stanford Law School shows that Black suspects are described in 32% of crime-related posts on social media but represent only 20% of arrests in the United States. 

As individuals disproportionately share news about such crimes via social media platforms, platform algorithms search for similar stories to insert into their feeds. This reinforces their original beliefs that such crimes are increasingly prevalent and incentivizes traditional media outlets to generate more content about similar crimes. This interplay between social media and traditional news outlets creates a self-reinforcing negative cycle. 

Thus, local cable networks and major news outlets are financially incentivized to overrepresent crimes online and on television news channels. It drives viewer engagement (similar to social media) and improves their ability to raise advertising prices. News outlets often sensationalize crimes, which further increases viewer engagement with their content.

Read More: Role of Forensics in Modern Criminal Investigations

While this model supports their business goals, it comes with a clear downside. By providing viewers with a steady stream of criminal news stories, news outlets give the public more reasons to be afraid than they would be just living their lives normally. It also drives the perception that crime is more prevalent than it is statistically accurate.

Overrepresentation of crime in entertainment

Considering the previous section of this article, it is not much of a stretch to see why entertainment companies incorporate sensationalized criminal activity into television shows and movies at a disproportionately high rate. 

Social media and traditional news outlets often portray criminal activity in ways that drive viewer engagement with entertainment content. Increased engagement for entertainment content ultimately drives more value to content creators and reinforces their financial incentives to focus on these storylines disproportionately.

While entertainment companies may not explicitly seek to portray specific local or national communities as prone to high levels of criminal activity, these narratives subconsciously reinforce the same messages being delivered via news platforms.

Conclusion

In conclusion, social media platforms, modern media outlets, and entertainment companies have overrepresented and sensationalized the frequency of crimes in various settings and those committed by various groups of people, creating a negative impact on society. 

While this article focused on negative portrayals, a future post will explore how media can also drive reform and accountability in law enforcement. This represents an area of tremendous opportunity for our country to come to terms with how we can address crimes in a more effective and less biased manne,r and will be the topic of a future article.