Previous research suggests that journalists assess the newsworthiness of homicide occurrences using the relative frequency of particular types of murders and how well specific murder occurrences mesh with stereotypical race and gender typifications. However, previous research also is marked by four important limits, including the failure to systematically examine intersections of race and gender. The present research remedies these problems and clarifies existing understandings of selection bias in news about murder in two important respects. Newsworthiness as represented by novelty is an incomplete explanation of selection bias. Instead, news about murder is the product of journalistic assessments of newsworthiness firmly grounded in long-standing race and gender typifications.
Sociological Forum, the official journal of the Eastern Sociological Society, is a peer-review journal that emphasizes innovative articles developing topics or areas in new ways or directions. While supporting the central interests of sociology in social organization and change, the journal also publishes integrative articles that link subfields of sociology or relate sociological research to other disciplines, thus providing a larger focus on complex issues. Building on the strength of specialization while stressing intellectual convergences, this publication offers special opportunities for using the techniques and concepts of one discipline to create new frontiers on others.
Springer is one of the leading international scientific publishing companies, publishing over 1,200 journals and more than 3,000 new books annually, covering a wide range of subjects including biomedicine and the life sciences, clinical medicine, physics, engineering, mathematics, computer sciences, and economics.
This item is part of JSTOR collection
For terms and use, please refer to our Terms and Conditions
Sociological Forum
© 2003 Springer
Request Permissions
