The relationship between exposing media news about Syrians and prejudice toward them: The moderating role of trust in media news

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2024-6-12
Şimşek, Yağmur
The studies examining the impact of media on intergroup attitudes showed that negative media contact influences attitudes towards outgroups as positive contact does. In particular, exposure to media news impacts attitudes and prejudices toward the outgroups. Additionally, some studies have shown that trust in the media may play a role in the relationship between exposure to media news and attitudes. In this regard, this study aimed to examine the effect of exposure to news about Syrians in different media channels on social distance preferences and negative emotions towards Syrians living in Türkiye. Moreover, it aimed to examine the role of trust in news across different media channels in this relationship. According to the results of the analyses conducted with 362 participants to test these purposes, we found that exposure to news in mainstream media and Internet news pages predicts social distance preferences for Syrians. Furthermore, we found that social media news exposure predicted social distance preferences and negative emotions toward Syrians. Moderation analysis results showed that only trust in mainstream media news played a role in the relationship between exposure to mainstream media news and social distance preferences. These results were discussed by evaluating prejudice components and different media channels.
Citation Formats
Y. Şimşek, “The relationship between exposing media news about Syrians and prejudice toward them: The moderating role of trust in media news,” M.S. - Master of Science, Middle East Technical University, 2024.