Chasing the Bad News: An Analysis of 2005 Iraq and Afghanistan War Coverage on NBC and Fox News Channel

Abstract

This study analyzes all stories aired on NBC Nightly News and Fox News Channel's Special Report With Brit Hume during 2005 about the U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and compares that coverage with real-world indicators to address an important question: Did the news media over-report bad news from these conflicts, as claimed by the Bush administration and as one might expect given research into the press' negativity bias? This study finds that while both channels focused a fair amount on negative storylines, overall the news actually underplayed bad news from both countries. Fox News was much more sympathetic to the administration than NBC, suggesting that scholars should consider Fox as alternative, rather than mainstream, media.