Victims of Islamist and right-wing terrorism in the press: Identifiability and humanization

Existing research suggests bias in the news coverage about Islamist (IT) and right-wing terrorism (RWT) when it comes to labeling, reporting frequency, or describing the perpetrators. Yet, little is known about differences in victim depiction between the two types of terrorism. We analyzed newspaper articles (N = 1,033) from four European countries to investigate how background, contextual factors, and victim characteristics shape whether victims are addressed as collective (vs. identifiable) victims and to which degree identifiable victims are humanized. Results suggest that articles about RWT refer to collective victims (vs. identifiable victims) more than IT articles. Humanization of identifiable victims is strongest when the terror impact in the country of newspaper origin is higher, the article is published in a tabloid, when the victim sustained fatal injuries, and when the victim is described as a minority member. Further results, limitations, and implications are discussed.