Sports versus War: Expanding the Game Frame

• In Event: Framing in the Wild and the Lab

Abstract

Media coverage of elections often employs a "game frame", where the strategic and competitive aspects of politics are emphasized. Part of this frame is the use of language related to sports or war, two other areas where opponents are engaged in zero-sum competition. Past work has identified sports and war language as a defining feature of the game frame, but has consistently treated them as interchangeable. I argue that framing politics as a war causes people to interpret politics differently than framing it as a sport or non-violent game.

I first run an experiment where I present information about a campaign but manipulate the framing to use language related to war, language related to sports, or neutral language. I measure perceptions of the politician being covered and find that that those who read the sports language do not differ in their perceptions of the politician from those who read coverage using neutral language. However, those who read coverage using war language saw the politician as significantly more extreme, disrespectful to political opponents, and willing to endorse political violence than those who read coverage using sports language or neutral language.

I supplement these experimental findings by using a dataset of more than 20 years of CNN political coverage to descriptively track the usage of war language over time in political coverage. I conclude that studies of political framing should examine not just whether coverage focuses on the competitive aspects of politics, but should also examine the type of competition being portrayed.

Author

• Alexander Tolkin, Duke University