If a Lead, Must It Bleed?
Over at Mind Hacks there’s a fun discussion about the media’s propensity to take epidemiological data regarding say the risk of some dread disease, to note the uncertainty inherent in such data and to then conclude that the risk could actually be much higher. Why not also note that the uncertainty also means the risk could be much lower? Is it just a matter of hyping a story to sell more newspapers?
I think it may be something else. I think it may have more to do with the product of the news industry – a narrative that customers want to buy. Accordingly, when the news seems not to fit with the readers’ worldviews (e.g. a report about the disparate outcomes between children in daycare versus those who stay home with their mothers) you can count on the reporter to note that the surprising result may be overstated. Thus, it may not be a matter of reporters not understanding such data or of wanting to fan the flames of a story but rather to pound the day’s news into a narrative to the liking of its readership.
