The Coverage of Persons with Disabilities in American Newspapers

Abstract

Surveys of individuals with disabilities and interpretive essays have criticized the media for their lack of coverage of disability issues and for stereotypical and inappropriate portrayals of persons with disabilities. We conducted an empirical study of a national sample of American newspapers to check the validity of these findings and ideas. We found, on the average, a sizeable number of substantial references to persons with disabilities or their family members on a daily basis. These references tended to occur in feature or “soft” news articles rather than “hard” news stories and to be about individuals with physical disabilities, mental retardation, or individuals identified by the generic labels “handicapped” and “disabled.” When articles mentioned the impact of the disability on the person's life, they often portrayed the negative impact of the disability. If articles considered the possibilities for the improvement of the person's condition, they frequently suggested the person's condition could be improved.