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A Feverish Spring: A Comparative Analysis of COVID-19 News Framing in Sweden, the UK, and Egypt

Based on framing and the social responsibility theoretical frameworks, this comparative study analyzes the dominance of frames in the media coverage of the COVID-19 global pandemic across three countries that have adopted different preventative measures: Sweden (herd immunity) the United Kingdom (fu...

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Main Author: El-Behary, Hend Abdelgaber Ahmed
Format: Thesis
Published: AUC Knowledge Fountain 2021
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access_status_str Open Access
author El-Behary, Hend Abdelgaber Ahmed
author_browse El-Behary, Hend Abdelgaber Ahmed
author_facet El-Behary, Hend Abdelgaber Ahmed
author_sort El-Behary, Hend Abdelgaber Ahmed
collection Thesis
description Based on framing and the social responsibility theoretical frameworks, this comparative study analyzes the dominance of frames in the media coverage of the COVID-19 global pandemic across three countries that have adopted different preventative measures: Sweden (herd immunity) the United Kingdom (full lockdown) and Egypt (partial lockdown ‘curfew’). While several studies have investigated the media’s role during COVID-19, few have analyzed the frames used by the media. The analyses that were made here, for the most part, is on individual countries. The current study bridges a gap by using a comparative approach to interpret the frames discovered in news articles and the tone of these stories across six media outlets in three different countries: Sweden (Dagens Nyheter and Aftonbladet) the United Kingdom (the Guardian and the Daily Mail) and Egypt (Youm 7 and Al-Ahram). Furthermore, this paper enriches scholarly studies on media framing and public health crises in Egypt that suffer from limited research. Using a quantitative content analysis over a time frame of five months and 10 days (from January 31 to July 9, 2020), a total of 585 news stories from six media outlets were analyzed. The findings of the story discovered that the morality, human Interest and fear frames were the dominant frames presented in the media across the three countries, while the Blame frame was the least common. A closer examination revealed significant differences among the three countries in six out of the seven frames analyzed. These frames excluded the morality frame and included: the attribution of responsibility frame; the human interest frame; the economic consequences frame; the conflict frame; the fear frame and the othering frame. Moreover, the study found statistical differences in tone of news stories across the three countries.
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institution American University in Cairo (Egypt)
last_indexed 2026-06-10T12:35:50.652Z
license_str Not specified — see source repository
provenance_str_mv Harvested via OAI-PMH from AUC Knowledge Fountain — bepress
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spelling oai:fount.aucegypt.edu:etds-2636 A Feverish Spring: A Comparative Analysis of COVID-19 News Framing in Sweden, the UK, and Egypt El-Behary, Hend Abdelgaber Ahmed Based on framing and the social responsibility theoretical frameworks, this comparative study analyzes the dominance of frames in the media coverage of the COVID-19 global pandemic across three countries that have adopted different preventative measures: Sweden (herd immunity) the United Kingdom (full lockdown) and Egypt (partial lockdown ‘curfew’). While several studies have investigated the media’s role during COVID-19, few have analyzed the frames used by the media. The analyses that were made here, for the most part, is on individual countries. The current study bridges a gap by using a comparative approach to interpret the frames discovered in news articles and the tone of these stories across six media outlets in three different countries: Sweden (Dagens Nyheter and Aftonbladet) the United Kingdom (the Guardian and the Daily Mail) and Egypt (Youm 7 and Al-Ahram). Furthermore, this paper enriches scholarly studies on media framing and public health crises in Egypt that suffer from limited research. Using a quantitative content analysis over a time frame of five months and 10 days (from January 31 to July 9, 2020), a total of 585 news stories from six media outlets were analyzed. The findings of the story discovered that the morality, human Interest and fear frames were the dominant frames presented in the media across the three countries, while the Blame frame was the least common. A closer examination revealed significant differences among the three countries in six out of the seven frames analyzed. These frames excluded the morality frame and included: the attribution of responsibility frame; the human interest frame; the economic consequences frame; the conflict frame; the fear frame and the othering frame. Moreover, the study found statistical differences in tone of news stories across the three countries. 2021-06-19T07:00:00Z thesis application/pdf https://fount.aucegypt.edu/etds/1616 https://fount.aucegypt.edu/context/etds/article/2636/viewcontent/Hend_Abdelgaber__Mohamed__Thesis.pdf Theses and Dissertations AUC Knowledge Fountain COVID-19 Pandemics Public Health Comparative research Coronavirus in Media Media Frames Communication and Health Crisis Infectious diseases Content Analysis Health Communication Journalism Studies Mass Communication
spellingShingle COVID-19
Pandemics
Public Health
Comparative research
Coronavirus in Media
Media Frames
Communication and Health Crisis
Infectious diseases
Content Analysis
Health Communication
Journalism Studies
Mass Communication
El-Behary, Hend Abdelgaber Ahmed
A Feverish Spring: A Comparative Analysis of COVID-19 News Framing in Sweden, the UK, and Egypt
title A Feverish Spring: A Comparative Analysis of COVID-19 News Framing in Sweden, the UK, and Egypt
title_full A Feverish Spring: A Comparative Analysis of COVID-19 News Framing in Sweden, the UK, and Egypt
title_fullStr A Feverish Spring: A Comparative Analysis of COVID-19 News Framing in Sweden, the UK, and Egypt
title_full_unstemmed A Feverish Spring: A Comparative Analysis of COVID-19 News Framing in Sweden, the UK, and Egypt
title_short A Feverish Spring: A Comparative Analysis of COVID-19 News Framing in Sweden, the UK, and Egypt
title_sort feverish spring a comparative analysis of covid 19 news framing in sweden the uk and egypt
topic COVID-19
Pandemics
Public Health
Comparative research
Coronavirus in Media
Media Frames
Communication and Health Crisis
Infectious diseases
Content Analysis
Health Communication
Journalism Studies
Mass Communication
url https://fount.aucegypt.edu/etds/1616
https://fount.aucegypt.edu/context/etds/article/2636/viewcontent/Hend_Abdelgaber__Mohamed__Thesis.pdf
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