Frame analysis helps researchers understand how issues are presented and interpreted in communication. Here's a step-by-step guide based on standard methodologies:
Effectively conducting a frame analysis involves a structured process of selecting materials, defining scope, sampling, identifying analysis units, choosing a framework, creating definitions, and ultimately identifying the frames themselves.
Steps for Conducting a Frame Analysis
Based on the provided reference steps, a typical frame analysis follows this structured approach:
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Step 1: Choose a medium / topic.
- Begin by selecting the specific medium or topic you wish to study. This involves deciding which form of media will be the focus of your analysis. Examples include newspaper articles, television news segments, social media posts, political speeches, or specific types of literature. Your choice should align with the research question you are trying to answer.
- Example: Analyzing how climate change is framed in major national newspapers, or how a specific political event was covered on cable news channels.
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Step 2: Determine a time-frame.
- Once the medium and topic are chosen, define the specific time period your analysis will cover. This scope helps manage the data collection process and ensures consistency in the analysis.
- Example: Examining media coverage of climate change during the two weeks leading up to a major international conference, or analyzing political event coverage for the entire month it occurred.
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Step 3: Draw a sample.
- Given the potentially large volume of media content, you typically need to select a representative sample from the chosen medium and time-frame. Various sampling methods can be used, such as random sampling, stratified sampling (e.g., ensuring representation from different types of newspapers), or purposive sampling (selecting specific key events or publications).
- Example: Randomly selecting 3 articles per day from 5 different newspapers over the specified time-frame.
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Step 4: Identify a unit of analysis.
- Define the specific piece of content you will analyze. This is your unit of analysis. It could be an entire news article, a paragraph, a single sentence, an image, a headline, or a complete broadcast segment. Consistency in defining the unit is crucial.
- Example: Analyzing each individual newspaper article as the unit of analysis, or focusing on individual social media posts.
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Step 5: Selection of a frame typology.
- Choose or develop a typology or framework for identifying frames. This could be a pre-existing list of common news frames (e.g., conflict frame, economic consequences frame, human interest frame) or a set of frames specifically developed based on initial exploration of your data. This step helps categorize the different ways the topic is presented.
- Example: Using a typology that includes frames like "economic impact," "public health crisis," and "individual responsibility" when analyzing coverage of a pandemic.
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Step 6: Operational definitions.
- For each frame in your chosen typology, create clear and specific operational definitions. This explains precisely what elements, keywords, phrases, images, or themes indicate the presence of a particular frame in your unit of analysis. These definitions guide the systematic identification of frames.
- Example: Defining the "economic impact" frame by looking for mentions of costs, jobs, GDP, business closures, or financial aid within the unit of analysis.
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Step 7: Identifying news frames.
- Systematically go through each unit of analysis in your sample and apply your operational definitions to identify which frames are present. This is the core coding process. You might use qualitative methods (close reading and interpretation) or quantitative methods (coding for the frequency of specific indicators or frames).
Practical Tips
- Start Small: If new to frame analysis, begin with a smaller sample size.
- Team Coding: If working with a team, ensure high inter-coder reliability by training coders together and checking for agreement on frame identification.
- Iterative Process: Frame analysis can be iterative; you might refine your typology or operational definitions as you analyze the data.
- Beyond Text: Remember frames can be communicated visually (images, layout) and aurally (sound, tone of voice) in different media.
By following these steps, researchers can systematically uncover the dominant ways issues are framed in various communication contexts, revealing underlying perspectives and potential influences on public understanding.
