The Framing of Celebrity Ambassadors for Global
Humanitarian Causes
Content analysis comparing the framing of UN Goodwill Ambassadors by the UN and the news media
Master’s Thesis
Graduate School of Communication
Master’s Program Communication Science: Corporate Communication
Ruta Butkute
Student number: 10827455
Supervisor: Tatiana Domingues Aguiar Date of completion: 30 January 2020
Abstract
Celebrities standing behind humanitarian and development causes has been a global phenomenon. While bringing media attention and funds to humanitarian crises and increasing the visibility of the organizations they represent, celebrity ambassadors have also been criticized for representing equality whilst embodying inequality. In this study, framing theory has been used to explore whether the discrepancy between positive and negative effects of deploying celebrities observed in other studies could be explained by the varying frames of ambassadors in the media. A quantitative content analysis was carried out on 188 articles (N=188) analyzing the framing of the United Nations
Goodwill Ambassadors’ in UN sourced articles and in liberal UK and US news media. Comparisons were made between the framing of Goodwill Ambassadors in terms of five generic news frames and four non-generic frames. Results indicate that generic news frames are not very prominent in articles about Goodwill Ambassadors and that there are more similarities than differences in the UN’s and the news media’s framing, with the exception of the expert/authority and apolitical frames, which are more prominent in UN’s communication. It is concluded that the UN’s framing of UN Goodwill
Ambassadors is quite aligned with the UK’s and US’ liberal news media.
Keywords: Goodwill Ambassador, liberal news media, United Nations, generic news frames, strategic communication
Introduction
Celebrities engaging in philanthropy, whether through monetary donations, advocacy, or campaigns, has been a very common occurrence in the last few decades. Celebrities can be “tools for teaching Western audiences about their emotional bonds and moral obligations to distant populations” (Wilson, 2014, p. 27) and thus they are used to bolster humanitarian campaigns. Having a wide audience in terms of age, gender, and educational background, celebrities are deployed as representatives of humanitarian causes to use their stardom to engage the public in international development agendas (Wheeler, 2011). So far the use of celebrities as representatives of humanitarian causes has been researched as a contentious strategy with mixed effects for non-profit
organizations, beneficiaries, and the public.
In terms of positive effects, scholars have indicated that organizations can get more prominence in the media and in the public discourse by using celebrity
ambassadors (Cottle & Nolan, 2007) and that celebrity diplomats give attention to causes that later become central in international diplomacy (Wheeler, 2011). Wheeler’s (2011) finding indicates that celebrity ambassadors have agenda-setting power. Agenda-setting is defined as the phenomenon where prominence of issues in the news affects the salience of those issues in the public (Carrol & McCombs, 2003).
There have been multiple other positive effects of celebrity ambassadors
observed. For non-profit organizations, celebrity ambassadors can be an opportunity to gain international credibility and legitimacy, as indicated by Alleyne (2005), referring specifically to the United Nations (UN). Other studies point to the effective use of celebrity ambassadors for acquiring donations (Um, 2018; Ilicic & Baxter, 2014). Celebrity ambassadors are also recognized as potent shapers of citizens for global
governance (Wilson, 2014). Global governance is activated when celebrities bring
Western citizens into contact with governmental bodies like the UN and incentivize them to practice “internationalism,” an ideology rooted in global integration with a
commitment to help global development (Wilson, 2014, p. 31). As such, celebrities are seen by some scholars as catalyzers of more active participation from the public in global humanitarian programs.
However, several studies also point out the negative consequences of deploying celebrity ambassadors. Daley (2013) argues that the use of celebrities in poverty
campaigns leads to the commodification of the global south and thus negatively impacts the beneficiaries they are supposed to protect. According to the author, the public
consumes celebrities’ lives just like other commodities instigating the same gratifying affects, rather than sincere consideration for the global south (Daley, 2013). When
celebrities campaign for various causes, a large part of the attention is shifted towards the “compassionate” and “sacrificing” (Daley, 2013, p. 379) celebrity, rendering the
beneficiaries invisible. Furthermore, Hopkins (2017) points out that feminist celebrity activists may actually contradict the cause of global gender equality , “it is perversely ironic that fashion models and movie stars are now packaged as icons of ‘global gender equality’” (Hopkins, 2017, p. 275). Hopkins specifically refers to white female actors who highly profit from the embodiment of patriarchal/western beauty standards and criticizes them for representing global gender equality because they rely on the existence of those standards for their careers (Hopkins, 2017). Thus, some scholars believe that celebrities are not suited to represent equality causes whilst living highly privileged lives.
Creating awareness and salience of global humanitarian needs seems to be the main motivation to use celebrity ambassadors by NPOs, but concurrent negative outcomes of deploying celebrity ambassadors point to an occasional discrepancy
between NPO’s intentions and effects. This research project seeks to explore this discrepancy by analyzing the framing mechanisms used by organizations deploying celebrity ambassadors, as well as the framing mechanisms used by the news media.
When celebrities become representatives of certain causes, as ambassadors, they are packaged into specific frames, where they are no longer just celebrities, but also philanthropists. Frames are “interpretative packages” (Gamson & Modigliani, 1989, p. 3) where a specific idea or message is emphasized, providing a way to interpret and
understand the issue (De Vreese, 2005). Frames are interpreted via a framing process in which people develop their attitude, opinion, or thinking about a specific issue (Chong & Druckman, 2007). Therefore, the way that celebrity ambassadors have been framed throughout the years could have contributed to both the positive and negative effects found in previous studies because frames can determine attitude towards an issue.
This research project aims to contribute to existing research about framing, particularly how NPOs framing may differ to news media’s framing of the same topic. Previous studies have analyzed how celebrity ambassadors are framed in the media or how celebrities frame themselves (Daley, 2013; Hopkins, 2017), but no study has analyzed how celebrity ambassadors are framed from the organizational perspective. Furthermore, previous studies have undertaken a qualitative approach with a sociological focus, whereas this study has a quantitative method with a communication science focus.
As NPOs rely heavily on the public’s monetary support, it is important to understand how this phenomenon is portrayed in the news media and whether it’s congruent with the organization’s communication. Since framing is considered a powerful tool that shapes the perception of an issue (Chong & Druckman, 2007), the identification of the varying frames used for celebrity ambassadors gives insights to organizations deploying this strategy how this phenomenon is framed and the effects it
may have on the public’s perception of the organization. A mbassadors are an extension of the organization and thus insights could also shed light on consequences on
organizational reputation in terms of their appointed celebrity ambassadors. This research project will specifically analyze the framing of UN Goodwill Ambassadors. The UN is one of the most notable organizations deploying celebrities for humanitarian causes with their Goodwill Ambassadors program in which “distinguished individuals, carefully selected from the fields of art, literature, science, entertainment, sports or other fields of public life” are chosen to create awareness on the work of the United Nations (“Who are the United Nations Goodwill Ambassadors and Messengers of Peace and how are they appointed?”, 2019). Today, there are over 100 Goodwill
Ambassadors representing 12 humanitarian sub-organizations of the UN. The UN was chosen as the organization for analysis due to its high visibility in the media and the high volume of celebrity ambassadors.
The framing of Goodwill Ambassadors in UN’s media channels will be compared to the top UK and US newspapers based on circulation. Articles from official UN
websites will be compared with 10 newspaper sources with a left-center bias. As such, the following research question is explored:
RQ: How does UN’s framing of international development celebrity ambassadors differ from US and UK news media’s framing?
Theoretical Framework Framing Theory
The main principle behind framing theory is that an issue can be conveyed in multiple ways and thus have multiple interpretations and effects (Chong & Druckman, 2007). A frame is determined and defined by the elements that are emphasized and dominant in the presented issue (De Vreese, 2005). Frames organize the social reality
and “promote particular definitions and interpretations” (Shah et al., 2002, p. 343) of issues. People interpret various frames and develop their attitude, opinion, or thinking about a specific issue based on the information cues provided (Chong & Druckman, 2007). Although perceptions cannot be controlled, framing can influence the way the public develops their opinion about celebrity ambassadors depending on the frames they are presented in the media.
In some cases, perceptions can be controlled and manipulated via strategic framing, which delivers the desired message the organization wants its readers to know (Bortree et al., 2013). Overall, framing is observed as a powerful communication device because small changes in the presentation of an issue can lead to big changes in public opinions and attitudes (Chong & Druckman, 2007). Accordingly, even small differences between the framing by the UN and the news media for celebrity ambass adors could have significant effects on public opinion, attitudes, and support for the organization.
There is an underlying assumption in this research that the way the UN frames their Goodwill Ambassadors differs from the news media’s framing. Research shows that news media resist the frames provided by organizations in press releases (Strauss & Vliegenthart, 2017). Accordingly, due to resistance to organizations ’ frames, newspaper articles use different frames and tones than organizations ’ press releases (Maat & De Jong, 2013). Furthermore, there is a genre conflict between press releases and press reports – the incompatibility leads to a change of the original frames and style of press releases in newspaper reports (Maat, 2008), although radical transformations are rare (Maat & de Jong, 2013).
Additionally, news media compete in frames and tone with other news media (Nijkrake, Gosselt, & Gutteling, 2014). Competing frames refer to the phenomenon when the same issue is re-framed by different news media to keep the public intrigued
and wanting to read more (Nijkrake, Gosselt, & Gutteling, 2014; Yan & Yeojin, 2015). By emphasizing different attributes of an issue (McCombs, 2004) multiple different frames for a single issue across a variety of news media sources are created. The news media compete in terms of which frame is the most successful in the media ( Nijkrake, Gosselt, & Gutteling, 2014). Thus it can be assumed that articles surrounding a single UN Goodwill Ambassadors will have a variety of frames in different news media.
All these findings indicate a likelihood that the frames presented on UN’s communication channels and in their press releases are different from the frames in the news media, as well as there are differences in framing between news media as they compete for readers. In this research, the differences in framing are analyzed via the prominence of nine frames. The types of frames are outlined in the section below.
Types of Frames
Five generic news frames and four non-generic frames, which have been
previously applied to analyze communication about humanitarianism and world issues, will be used for the analysis. First, the non-generic frames will be outlined followed by the generic frames, including the hypotheses about the differences in framing by the UN and the news media.
Non-Generic Frames
Daley (2013) identified two frames that celebrities use to frame humanitarian crises: the apolitical and expert/authority. Even though her research is on how celebrities frame humanitarian crises through their own communication, it nevertheless gives
insight into possible ways organizations may also frame their celebrity ambassadors. Apolitical frame. In the apolitical frame, the celebrity ambassador is
tends to avoid political details and political views; humanitarian crises can be presented as moral problems (sometimes with religious reasoning), not political problems. The use of this frame can appeal to a wider audience because politics are left out of it, but the stripping of the historical and political context of an issue doesn’t provide the full picture of an issue and thus can be misrepresentative (Daley, 2013).
It is expected that the UN will use apolitical framing to a greater extent than the news media. The UN is an intergovernmental organization responsible for conserving global peace and for bettering the equality of people worldwide (Pauls & Cranmer, 2017). By this
definition, the UN is not an apolitical organization, but it seeks to avoid conflict. Therefore, apolitical framing may serve the UN when presenting the Goodwill Ambassador by avoiding political division. Comparably, a study has indicated that celebrity ambassadors
decontextualize themselves from politics when they represent humanitarian issu es (Daley, 2013). However, in apolitical frames, crises are framed as moral obligations where the public has a personal responsibility to help out, often aided with religious tenets (Daley, 2013). Since the UN is a secular organization, the use of moral arguments, specifically religious, seems unlikely. Thus it is anticipated that only one dimension of the apolitical frame, decontextualizing politics, will be used for Goodwill Ambassadors by the UN.
It is expected that the news media will use apolitical framing to a lesser extent. The selection of news media for the analysis has a moderate liberal bias, which means there is an attempt to influence the audiences to favor liberal causes (Search and Learn the Bias of News Media). Similar to framing, the news media’s own political orientation can affect how an issue is portrayed (Dotson et al., 2012), the selection of topics that get coverage, and the types of frames used (Shor et al., 2014). Liberal views have leftist tendencies that sway away from religion as opposed to conservative views that place high regard on tradition, individual rights, and minimal government intervention (Dotson et al., 2012). Therefore, it seems
unlikely that the selected news media would use apolitical framing for Goodwill
Ambassadors prominently since the newspapers are already slightly politically oriented, and not oriented towards any religion.
Hypothesis 1: The apolitical frame for Goodwill Ambassadors is more prominent in the UN’s communication than in the news media’s.
Expert/authority frame. In the expert/authority frame the celebrity is accredited a deep understanding of the cause they represent (Daley, 2013). Expertise is defined as having direct experience in the field or through association with a known expert, acquired education, and a campaign track record (Daley, 2013).
It is expected that the use of the expert/authority frame will be more prominent by the UN than the news media. According to UN’s Goodwill Ambassador guidelines, appointed individuals are expected to visit UN operations in the field, and when they do, they are considered “Experts on Mission” (“Who are the United Nations Goodwill Ambassadors and Messengers of Peace and how are they appointed? ”, 2019). In line with their official guidelines, it seems plausible that the use of the expert/authority frame would serve the UN strategically well since the organization explicitly intends to portray the Goodwill
Ambassadors as experts.
It is expected that the news media will use the expert/authority frame with less prominence than the UN because the motivation to portray UN Goodwill Ambassadors as experts is smaller. A case study on how UN Women Goodwill Ambassadors are framed in Australian women’s magazines revealed that celebrity ambassadors have been framed as authoritative figures (Hopkins, 2017). The author argues this is because journalists are “complicit in maximizing the commercial appeal of the humanitarian celebrity” (Hopkins, 2017, p. 281). Since some readers consider celebrities as authorities, continuing the narrative is profitable for the media (Hopkins, 2017). Even though liberal news media under analysis
have different agendas than women’s magazines, they are not immune to commercial appeal (De Dobbelaer, Van Leuven, & Raeymaeckers, 2017). Thus the news media under analysis may also frame the Goodwill Ambassador as an authority, however, given the UN’s high motivation to frame their ambassadors as experts, the expert/authority is expected to be more prominent in UN’s articles than in the news.
Hypothesis 2: The expert/authority frame for Goodwill Ambassadors in more prominent in UN’s communication than in the news media’s.
Gain and loss frames. There has been considerable research attention dedicated to framing issues via the problem frame. Problems can be framed in negative ways, in terms of losses, and in positive ways, in terms of gains (Bortree et al., 2013). Thus this frame contains two dimensions: gains and losses (Bortree et al., 2013; Kim, 2014; Cho & Choi, 2010). Since the UN humanitarian organizations seek to highlight world problems through the Goodwill Ambassadors program, the use of this frame is deemed
appropriate. The problem frame has been extensively studied in terms of persuasion
effectiveness in health campaigns (Quick & Bates, 2010; Cho & Choi, 2010; Kim, 2014) and framing environmental responsibility in CSR messages (Bortree et al., Davis, 1995). The UN deploys celebrities to bolster their campaign effectiveness in the fields of health, the
environment, and several other campaigns, and thus analyzing the framing with these two dimensions is also relevant.
The loss frame emphasizes the negative consequences of not taking action and accentuates losses, existing or future (Bortree et al., 2013). For example, the negative consequences of a natural disaster that already happened or the future consequences of not recycling plastic. Accentuating how negative consequences can be prevented, how something ‘shouldn’t be done’, also constitutes as the loss frame (Bortree et al., 2013).
On the other hand, the gain frame is about positive outcomes and accentuates gains (Bortree et al., 2013). It emphasizes favorable consequences, such as solutions to an issue or event, and what can be or what has been improved (Bortree et al., 2013).
As the introduction of Goodwill Ambassador is intended as a positive addition to the work of the UN, it is expected that the gain frame will be more present in the UN’s communication than the loss frame. Previous research shows organizations tend to use the gain frame more to elicit positive emotions in their readers (Bortree et al., 2013). However, when an issue is framed in terms of losses, it sticks in readers’ minds more than if an issue is framed in terms of gains (Ledgerwood & Boydstun, 2014). It seem s unlikely that the loss frame would be used by the UN to gain memorability since the use of a celebrity is already a strategic move to increase media salience (Cottle & Nolan, 2007). Furthermore, it is harder to re-frame an issue as a gain once it has been framed as a loss (Ledgerwood & Boydstun, 2014), thus using the loss frame seems
disadvantageous for the UN. On the contrary, the news media are interested in attracting readers, and negative news attracts more readers than positive news (Arango-Kure, Garz, & Rott, 2014). Thus it is anticipated that the UN uses the gain frame for Goodwill
Ambassadors with more prominence, whereas the news media use the loss frame with more prominence.
Hypothesis 3: The gain frame for Goodwill Ambassadors is more prominent in the UN’s communication than in the news media’s.
Hypothesis 4: The loss frame for Goodwill Ambassadors is more prominent in the news media’s communication than in the UN’s.
Generic Frames
In addition to the four frames mentioned, five generic news frames will be used to analyze the articles. A study on humanitarian crises news frames (Ardèvol-Abreu, 2015) has
also used the generic frames proposed by Semetko and Valkenburg (2000): conflict, human interest, economic consequences, morality, and responsibility. Generic frames allow for comparisons across multiple sources because as they address “the journalistic values that characterize all media texts” (Kozman, 2017, p. 781). Since news media texts are different to UN sourced texts, generic frames enables comparison.
Conflict frame. The conflict frame “emphasizes conflict between individuals, groups, or institutions as a means of capturing audience interest and it is most often used by news media” (Semetko & Valkenburg, 2000, p. 95). Journalists have been found to take an active stance in conflict frame building by inflating the possible consequences of the conflict and using overstated language (Bartholomé, Lecheler, & de Vreese, 2015).
Human interest frame. The human interest frame personalizes, dramatizes, or “emotionalizes” (Semetko & Valkenburg, 2000, p. 96) the news. It is more often found in tabloids to capture the audience’s attention based on the individual’s story (Semetko & Valkenburg, 2000; Godefroidt, Berbers, & D’Haenens, 2016).
Economic consequences frame. The economic consequences frame reports an issue in terms of economic consequences (Semetko & Valkenburg, 2000). This frame is used quite often because it stresses the breadth of an event and attracts the public’s attention
(Godefroidt, Berbers, & D’Haenens, 2016).
Morality frame. The morality frame contextualizes the issue in terms of “religious tenets or moral prescriptions” (Semetko & Valkenburg, 2000, p. 96). To maintain objectivity, newspapers often use direct quotes from individuals to use the morality frame (Godefroidt, Berbers, & D’Haenens, 2016).
Responsibility frame. The responsibility frame attributes responsibility for the issue at hand to an individual, the government, or a group (Semetko & Valkenburg, 2000). This frame shapes an understanding of who is to blame for an issue (Iyengar, 1987).
It is not expected that all of the five generic frames will be equally prominent in articles about Goodwill Ambassadors by the UN nor the news media. Predictions are made on only two of the generic frames, conflict and responsibility, while the other frames will be discussed in relation to the findings. Conflict and responsibility frames were chosen for the hypotheses as the high use of these frames is presumed to negatively affect the UN’s mission: the primary aim of the UN and its branch organizations is to resolve disagreements and avoid conflict (Pauls & Cranmer, 2017). Thus emphasizing conflict and attributing blame via conflict and responsibility frames seems unconducive to the UN. It is expected that the news media’s prominence of these frames will be higher than the UN’s because it was already discovered that the news journalists take an active role in conflict frame building
(Bartholomé, Lecheler, & de Vreese, 2015) and the responsibility frame is prevalent in the news (Semetko & Valkenburg, 2000).
Hypothesis 5: The conflict and responsibility frames for Goodwill Ambassadors are more prominent in the news media’s communication than in the UN’s.
Methodology
This research project is carried out via a quantitative content analysis of news articles and UN sourced articles about Goodwill Ambassadors. A systematic analysis is crucial to gain insights about the prominence of different frames, as well as the comparison of frames between the two sources, thus a quantitative content analysis approach was deemed suitable for this research. Content analysis allows for transparent research of a high volume of content (Bryman, 2012), which is necessary in this case of interpreting the prominence of frames in a large sample of text articles.
The starting point for setting the sample was selecting the specific Goodwill
Ambassadors, which would define the articles for the analysis. There are over 100 celebrities representing the UN and thus the celebrities were narrowed down by nationality – the UK and the US. The language of analysis is English, therefore, it was decided to choose celebrities from English speaking countries in which national media are likely to produce news coverage about them. Moreover, many celebrities representing the UN from the US and the UK are globally very famous, rather than only nationally, and thus it is interesting to analyze them because they can be assumed to have significant prominence in the media.
An initial list of 39 celebrities from the US and the UK was drawn. It was decided to narrow down the criteria to celebrities representing organizations involved in global
development (selected organizations and their functions are listed in Appendix C Table 2). Two celebrities from each organization were randomly selected as there was no obvious differentiating criteria. In total, 12 Goodwill Ambassadors were selected (listed in Appendix C Table 4).
UN sourced articles. All the UN sourced articles were selected using the search option on UN websites corresponding to the organization the celebrity represents, as well as the main UN news portal: news.un.org. Only the articles that included the celebrity in the title were selected because they had the celebrity as their main focus and thus were relevant for the analysis, whereas articles just mentioning the celebrity with no further context were not. In total, 98 UN sourced articles were selected for the sample, of which seven were press releases. Articles dated from 2001-2019 and were collected in November 2019. The number of articles per UN source are listed in Appendix C Table 1.
News articles. 10 news sources were used for the analysis. Five UK news sources (The Guardian, The Independent, BBC News, Mirror, Sky News ) and five US news sources (New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, Star Tribune, USA Today) were
selected. These papers were chosen from lists of newspapers leading in circulation in the UK (Statista Research Development, 2019) and the US (Watson, 2019). The choice was narrowed down to five papers per country by selecting all papers that are left-center oriented. This was a pragmatic choice since the majority of the papers were left-center oriented.
The articles in each newspaper were selected by searching for keywords on the news website, for example: “Emma Watson Goodwill Ambassador”, and through the search engine Google, for example: “Emma Watson Goodwill Ambassador Washington Post”. All the articles that contained the specific celebrity name with the attribution of the keywords ‘Goodwill Ambassador’ either in the title or body of the text were selected. In total 90 news articles from 10 news sources were selected for the sample, dating from the years 2001-2019 and collected in November 2019. The number of articles per news source is listed in
Appendix C Table 1.
Measures
A codebook with 35 codes and an instruction manual was devised (see Appendix A) based on an in-depth reading of previous literature relevant to the frames under analysis (Semetko & Valkenburg, 2000; Ardevol-Abreu, 2015; Daley 2013, Bortree et al., 2013). The codebook addresses general details about the articles and the nine frames.
The prominence of frames were coded for in news articles and UN sourced articles about Goodwill Ambassadors. Five generic news frames were coded using the same question items as previous research (Semetko & Valkenburg, 2000), with minimal adaptation to the wording. However, the answer scale was not only a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ as in the original study. Instead, the coder had to choose whether “the text suggests or mentions…the aspect or issue to which the item refers” (Ardevol-Abreu, 2015, p. 710) only once (1), more than once (2) or not at all (0). This scale was used in previous research for the same codebook (Ardevol-Abreu, 2015). While this scale requires coders to be more vigilant and may decrease
inter-coder reliability, it also provides better insights to the degree of the frame’s presence or absence in an article. Coder training was, therefore, essential to ensure reliability.
The codes for the non-generic frames were created based on Daley’s (2013) and Bortree et al. (2013) definitions of the frames. The apolitical frame has two dimensions: decontextualized politics and moral/religious reasoning. To code this frame, questions were devised to address the degree of the political context and degree of moral/religious reasoning. The expert/authority frame specifically addresses whether the Goodwill Ambassador is portrayed as an authoritative figure with direct experience in the field. On the contrary, the gain and loss frames were more general, not about the Goodwill Ambassador specifically. The gain frame is coded as a degree of positive outcomes mentioned in the articles, the loss frame is coded as a degree of negative outcomes. The non-generic frames have been coded using the same answer key (‘0’, ‘1’, ‘2’) as the generic news frames.
In order to calculate the results, the multiple codes measuring the frames had to computed for comparisons. The frame variables were computed by taking the mean value of all codes measures a frame. Independent sample t-tests were conducted to compare the prominence of the frames amongst the two different sources.
Procedure
A pre-test was conducted on 10 percent of the sample with one other coder. The fellow coder was briefed about the study and about the codebook where questions and examples were clarified. In total, 19 articles were coded by both coders.
Intercoder reliability was calculated with Krippendorff’s alpha. After the first pre-testing round, Krippendorf’s alphas for the 27 variables ranged from 1 to 0,43. The pre-test highlighted a lot of discrepancies, particularly for the morality and responsibility frame variables. This was overcome by providing better examples to questions in the codebook. There was also a need to emphasize close reading of the articles as there were inaccuracies
when coding for the aspect or issue to which the item refers occurring once or multiple times (coded as ‘1’ or ‘2’ accordingly). Coders were urged to take more time reading and pay better attention to the answer key. After re-training, all variables were reliable; Krippendorff’s alphas ranged from 1 to 0,77 (see all values in Appendix B).
Results
Overall, non-generic frames (M = .69, SD= .24) were used with more prominence than generic frames (M = .24, SD = .23). This finding is depicted in figure 1. A paired samples t-test indicated that the difference between these means is significant, and the effect is very large, t(187) = 18.97, p < .001, 95% CI [0.41, 0.50], d = 1.38. In terms of differences between the two sources, the UN (M = .82, SD = .26) uses non-generic frames with more prominence than the news media (M = .57, SD = .31). This difference in means is significant with a large effect size, indicated by an independent samples t-test, t(186) = 5.97, p < .001, 95% CI [0.17, 0.33], d=.88. However, the use of generic news frames by the UN (M = .24, SD = .23) is almost equal to the news media (M = .24, SD= .23) as the difference in means is insignificant, t(186) = .15, p =.880, 95% CI [-0.06, 0.07].
Figure 1. Non-generic vs generic frame prominence (means)
The prominence of frames for both the UN and the news media can be observed in figure 2. For the UN, the most prominent frames were the expert/authority (M= 1.01, SD=.59), gain (M= .94, SD=.89), and loss (M= .89, SD=.93). The least prominent frames were the morality (M= .15, SD= .32), conflict (M= .18, SD=.33), and economic consequences (M= .22, SD= .48). For the news media, the most prominent frames were the gain (M= 1.00, SD=.54), loss (M= .60, SD=.87), and human interest (M= .48, SD=.43). The least prominent frames were the economic consequences (M= .10, SD= .24), conflict (M= .15, SD=.30), and morality (M= .22, SD= .36). The mean prominence of each frame overall and in each source are listed in Appendix C Table 3.
0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1 Non-generic Generic UN News
Figure 2. The means of frame prominence in UN and news articles
Apolitical Frame
To test hypothesis 1, whether the prominence of the apolitical frame is higher in UN articles (M= .44, SD= .29) than in news media articles (M=.27, SD= .27), an independent samples t-test was conducted. The difference between the means is significant, t(186)= 4.13, p < .001, 95% CI [0.09, 0.25], with a medium effect size, d= 0.61. Thus hypothesis 1 is supported: the prominence of the apolitical frame in articles about Goodwill Ambassadors is higher in the UN’s communication than in the news media’s.
Expert/authority Frame 0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1 1.2 UN News
To test hypothesis 2, whether the prominence of the expert/authority frame is higher in UN articles (M= 1.01, SD= .59) than in news media’s articles (M = .41, SD=.54), an independent samples t-test was conducted. The difference between the means is significant, t(186)= 7.21, p < .001, 95% CI [0.44, 0.76], with a very large effect size, d= 1.05. Thus hypothesis 2 is supported: the prominence of the expert/authority frame in articles about Goodwill Ambassadors is higher in the UN’s communication than in the news media’s.
Gain Frame
To test hypothesis 3, whether the prominence of the gain frame is higher in UN articles (M= .94, SD= .89) than in news media’s articles (M = 1.00, SD= .83), an independent samples t-test was conducted. The prominence of the gain frame is not higher in UN articles and the difference between the means is insignificant, t(186)=-.48, p= .629, 95% CI [-0.31, 0.19]. Thus hypothesis 3 is rejected: the gain frame is not more prominent in in articles about Goodwill Ambassadors in UN’s communication compared to the news media’s; the
prominence of the gain frame is fairly equal in both UN and news media articles.
Loss Frame
To test hypothesis 4, whether the prominence of the loss frame is higher in news media articles (M= .60, SD= .87) than in UN’s articles (M= .89, SD= .93) an independent samples t-test was conducted. The difference in means is significant with a small effect size, t(186)=2.19, p=.03, 95% CI [0.03, 0.55], d= .32. However, the prominence of the loss frame was not higher in the news media articles than in UN articles, it was lower. Therefore, hypothesis 4 is rejected: the use of the loss frame in articles about Goodwill Ambassadors is not more prominent in news media than in UN articles. On the contrary: the use of the loss
frame is significantly more prominent in the UN’s articles than in the news media articles, although the effect is small.
Conflict and Responsibility frames
To test hypothesis 5, whether the prominence of the conflict and responsibility frames are more prominent in news media articles than in UN articles, independent samples t-tests were conducted. The prominence of the conflict frame in UN articles (M= .29, SD= .34) was slightly higher than in the news media’s (M = .25, SD= .39). However, this difference in means is insignificant, t(186)= .79, p = .429, 95% CI [-0.05, 0.13]. The use of the
responsibility frame was also slightly higher in prominence in UN’s articles (M= .23, SD= .43) than in the news media’s articles (M=.22, SD= .42), however, this difference was also insignificant, t(185.17) = .69, p= .491, 95% CI [-0.07, 0.14]. Therefore, hypothesis 5 is rejected: the prominence of the conflict and responsibility frames is not higher in news media articles than in the UN articles.
Figure 3. Total number of articles per celebrity
Figure 4. Number of articles per year: UN vs. News
Exploratory Findings
In the sample, out of the 12 Goodwill Ambassadors, two celebrities received the highest media and organizational coverage (Figure 3): Angelina Jolie (N = 73) and Emma Watson (N = 52). Between the years 2001 and 2013 the UN (M=3.62, SD= 2.02) and the news media (M=1.38, SD= 1.66) published fewer articles on average per year than between 2014 and 2017, when the average number of articles published was highest, UN (M=7.83, SD= 3.76); News (M= 12, SD= 5.33). The timeline for the number of articles published per year is depicted in figure 4.
Discussion
The main aim of this study was to analyze how the framing of UN Goodwill
Ambassadors differs by the UN compared with the news media. This section will first discuss 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 2001200220032004200520062007200820092010201120122013201420152016201720182019 UN News
some of the similarities in framing and then the differences. Exploratory findings of the study will also be discussed.
Framing Similarities
The use of the generic frames was significantly less prominent by both actors than the use of non-generic frames, indicated by the very large effect size. While this is surprising as generic news frames are specifically categorized as the frames that can be found in news sources (Valkenburg, Semetko & De Vreese, 1999), perhaps left-center UK and US news sources refrain from those frames when writing stories surrounding UN Goodwill
Ambassadors. It is possible that the generic frames, specifically morality, economic
consequences, and conflict, do not fit the message the news and the UN is trying to put out to the public.
Of all the generic frames, both the news media and the UN used the human interest frame with most prominence, which is usually observed in tabloids (Godefroidt, Berbers, & D’Haenens, 2016). Perhaps because celebrities are usually a tabloid topic, newspapers also adopt this frame when covering celebrities. While this may be surprising because the frame analysis was on articles about celebrities in a humanitarian context, rather than public scandals – what tabloids pick up on, the human interest frame is about more than just focusing on the personal lives of celebrities. This frame has an emotional twist by
emphasizing how individuals or groups are affected by an issue (Semetko & Valkenburg, 2000). Thus it appears that both the UN and the news media, to a small degree, use an emotional appeal in articles about Goodwill Ambassadors via the human interest frame.
The human interest frame can have negative consequences on recall (Valkenburg et al., 1999), but also captures and retains audience interest (Bennet, 1995). Thus, this study’s findings suggest that the use of the human interest frame by the news media and the UN can make Goodwill Ambassadors visible and interesting for the public, but not necessarily
memorable in terms of the context around the ambassadors. However, since the prominence of the human interest frame was relatively moderate, the possible impact of this frame should be interpreted with caution.
Higher prominence of non-generic frames can be explained by their focus, which was tailored to the topic of ‘Goodwill Ambassadors’, as such, they were issue-specific frames (Kozman, 2017). The non-generic frames chosen for this research have been used in a previous study (Daley, 2013) and thus these findings confirm the presence of the specific non-generic frames in news and UN articles about Goodwill Ambassadors.
The gain and loss frames were also very prominent in UN articles about Goodwill Ambassadors. It was observed that the type of articles the UN publishes about Goodwill Ambassadors usually fell into two categories, either reporting a humanitarian crisis or promoting the celebrity as the ambassador. As such, the gain and loss frames serve the UN’s packaging of the message where the celebrity ambassador is framed in a positive way via the gain frame, which emphasizes opportunities and improvements, whereas crises can be framed in the loss frame, which emphasizes either negative outcomes or preventative measures.
Similarly, the gain and loss frames were of the highest prominence in news articles about Goodwill Ambassadors. The expectations that the gain frame will be more prominent in UN’s articles and the loss frame will be more prominent in news articles were not met. On the contrary, the loss frame was more prominent in UN’s articles than news media’s and the gain frame was almost equal in prominence. This can be explained by the type of articles the UN writes about Goodwill Ambassadors compared to the news media. The UN’s articles go in-depth about specific issues Goodwill Ambassadors are involved in, which are usually set in conflict and disaster zones, where more losses rather than gains are reported. Therefore, the high use of loss frame is explained by the reported topic. The news media, on the other hand, rarely writes content about Goodwill Ambassadors where the emphasis is on the losses
as a result of conflict or disaster. While previous research shows that the news prefer negative news (Arango-Kure, Garz, & Rott, 2014), this phenomenon was not observed in this study.
Previous research demonstrated that the gain frame is associated with more positive emotions in readers (Bortree et al., 2013), whereas the loss frame increases readers
memorability of the article (Ledgerwood & Boydstun, 2014), bolsters message elaboration (Kim, 2012), and amplifies the importance of the issue (Ash & Schierbach, 2013).
Therefore, the high prominence of these frames in all articles can make the readers perceive the context surrounding Goodwill Ambassadors as important and memorable while also eliciting good emotions. However, in both sources, it was observed that a degree of the two frames can be present simultaneously which renders implications of such framing less clear when both frames are present.
UN and news articles also have in common the low prominence frames. Interestingly enough, the conflict and responsibility frames were not very prominent in either source, even though conflict and accountability are part of the UN Goodwill Ambassador’s work. The prominence of these frames is very similar in the news media’s and the UN’s articles. Even though Goodwill Ambassadors often work in conflict-stricken areas, the issues are not framed in terms of conflict; the details of disputes are rarely mentioned, and if so, very objective reporting is done. Furthermore, although both UN and news articles often contain stress that an issue is urgent, an element of the responsibility frame, another element of this frame – the attribution of blame to various stakeholders – is rarely observed. Furthermore, the low prominence of the other generic frames such as morality and economic consequences is also a commonality for the UN and the news. Therefore, the relatively low prominence of the conflict, responsibility, morality, and economic consequences frames indicates that both the UN and the news media try to position themselves as neutral and objective reporters of
the crises surrounding Goodwill Ambassadors’ work, with a low degree of attribution of responsibility to issues.
Framing Differences
The key difference in the framing of Goodwill Ambassadors by the UN and the news is the prominence of the expert/authority frame. The UN used the expert/authority frame most prominently, while the news media’s use of this frame is about three times less. This finding indicates that not only do celebrities ambassadors themselves try to frame themselves as experts in the field (Daley, 2013), the organizations deploying the celebrities also attempt to do that. The expert/authority frame serves the UN organizations by portraying their Goodwill Ambassadors as knowledgeable figures (Daley, 2013). As such, Goodwill Ambassadors can be perceived as authoritative diplomats, not only glamorous Hollywood celebrities.
Previous research indicated that Australian women’s magazines have also framed celebrity ambassadors as experts (Hopkins, 2017). This finding is in line with the image the UN is trying to achieve with its Goodwill Ambassador program – namely that the celebrities are “Experts on Mission” (“Who are the United Nations Goodwill Ambassadors and Messengers of Peace and how are they appointed?”, 2019). In this study, news media’s less prominent use of this frame demonstrates that it is not as invested in portraying Goodwill Ambassadors as experts. It can be argued that because the UN is more invested in portraying the celebrities as credible representatives of complex causes, it seeks to emphasize expertise qualities in its communication. On the other hand, the news media does not have an agenda to portray celebrity ambassadors as experts.
The UN also used the apolitical frame about two times as prominently as the news media. Both the UN and the news media decontextualize politics and they tend not to use moral or religious arguments in articles about Goodwill Ambassadors, but the UN does it to a
higher extent, particularly the decontextualization of politics. As the news sources were all politically left-center oriented, the low prominence of the apolitical frame is coherent with the political and non-religious orientation of the sources. The moderate presence of the apolitical frame in UN’s communication indicates that it does decontextualize politics from issues Goodwill Ambassadors are involved in, which is in line with previous findings that some celebrities deliberately decontextualize themselves from politics in their own rhetoric (Daley, 2013). When celebrity ambassadors decontextualize politics from issues “they do not challenge the inequalities of global power relations” and “shift the public’s attention
(especially that of the young) away from exploring the roots of the crises to tackling the manifestations” (Daley, 2013, p. 390). However, since the prominence of this frame was relatively moderate the effects of such framing are not certain to be present.
The findings of this study have some organizational relevance. NPOs deploying celebrity ambassadors, especially the UN organizations, can observe the trends of how they are framed in the news media. These organizations can then reflect on whether the way their ambassadors are framed in a way that meets their organization’s strategy. Follow up
measures, such as establishing different media relations with the press, could be implemented by the organizations. In terms of academic relevance, this study contributes to research about generic frames and is the only quantitative study addressing the way celebrity ambassadors are framed in the media.
Exploratory Findings Discussion
It is worthwhile to explain some exploratory observations from the study. In terms of celebrity ambassadors having media prominence (Cottle & Nolan, 2007; Wilson, 2014), in this study, not all Goodwill Ambassadors had equal prominence. Overall, there were two clear Goodwill Ambassadors stars: Emma Watson and Angelina Jolie. These celebrities received the highest coverage in the news media as well as coverage by the UN. This is not
surprising as these women are some of the most active Goodwill Ambassadors deployed by the UN, indicated by the number of field trips and projects they undertake. Angelina Jolie has even been acclaimed the title ‘Special Envoy’ for her dedication to the organization UNHCR, which has likely contributed to the media coverage about her work as a celebrity ambassador. Similarly, Emma Watson’s appointment as Goodwill Ambassador in 2014 has instigated the highest newspaper coverage for that and following years in the news sources analyzed. Therefore, while previous studies claim celebrities have the power to give media prominence to the organization (Wilson, 2014), in this study, it is seen that the major left-center papers in the US and UK give only elevated prominence to celebrities that are highly involved in humanitarian work, being globally very famous is not enough.
Conclusion
The following research question was explored: How does UNs framing of
international development celebrity ambassadors differ from the news media’s framing? It can be concluded that the framing of Goodwill Ambassadors by the UN and the news media is quite similar with a few differences.
Both the UN and the news media were found to use the non-generic news frames more than the generic frames. Of the generic news frames, both actors use the human interest frame most prominently. There are no significant differences between the uses of the gain and loss frames, nor the conflict and responsibility frames.
Furthermore, decontextualization of politics is observed in both sources via the apolitical frame, but this is more prominent in the UN’s communication than the news. The biggest difference between the UN and the news media in terms of Goodwill Ambassador framing is the prominence of the expert/authority frame, in which ambassadors framed as experts in the field. While this was the UN’s most prominent frame, the news media’s prominence of this frame was about three times less.
Limitations and Future Research
Despite several significant results in this study, findings should be interpreted with caution as there are some limitations to this study. Firstly, regarding the sample, findings can be generalized to only US and UK Goodwill Ambassadors. Moreover, the study only
considers how these ambassadors are framed in left-center newspapers as opposed to right-oriented papers or even tabloids. It is possible that celebrities from other countries and in different news sources are framed differently. Additionally, since not all Goodwill Ambassadors are covered equally by the media or even by the UN, the findings are more representative of a handful of celebrities that dominated the sample, rather than representing the 12 celebrities in the sample equally.
Regarding the method, coder training proved difficult due to time constraints and lengthy codebook. While acceptable inter-coder reliability was reached, the study is limited by the fact that one coder coded the majority of the sample. Furthermore, the lengthy
codebook can be tedious on coders, reducing the reliability of their responses. It would have also been better to use a newspaper database for the collection of news articles because manual collection of articles is more difficult to replicate.
There are a few suggestions for future research. It could take into consideration how different types of Goodwill Ambassadors from various countries are framed in different media, for example, in tabloids. While frames give an indication of how celebrity
ambassadors are portrayed, the effects of such framing are not derived from content analysis. Thus future research could also take into consideration the effects of specific frames on the perception of Goodwill Ambassadors in the public. Thus a mixed-methods approach is suggested where readers are given a survey about their perception of celebrity ambassadors based on the articles. Lastly, since generic news frames showed to be low in prominence in
the media coverage of this topic, future research could attempt a deductive approach and form frames based on what elements are emphasized in the articles.
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Appendix A Codebook Introduction
The aim of this study is to examine what kind of frames are used in articles about UN
Goodwill Ambassadors . UN Goodwill Ambassadors are “distinguished individuals, carefully selected from the fields of art, literature, science, entertainment, sports or other fields of public life” (“Who are the United Nations Goodwill Ambassadors and Messengers of Peace and how are they appointed?”, 2019) that are chosen by UN organizations to create
awareness on their work. There are over 100 Goodwill Ambassadors representing 12 humanitarian organizations of the UN worldwide. Since Goodwill Ambassadors are usually celebrities of higher status, they receive significant media coverage with regard to their activities with the UN. This study will analyze five U.S and five U.K newspaper coverage about Goodwill Ambassadors. Articles written by the UN and UN organizations will also be analyzed from official websites. The goal of the analysis is to compare the frame prominence for Goodwill Ambassadors by the UN and the news media.
General coding instructions
Each coder will be designated a percentage of the sample to code. The division of the sample can be found in Appendix II. The articles for analysis have been downloaded from the web and uploaded into a GoogleDrive folder which coders can access.
Coding units
The coding units are the newspaper articles, newspaper press releases, UN press releases, and UN articles. Coders are supposed to code all of the text in the article, but not the images (unless instructed specifically in an item). Video material present in articles should be coded as well.
Sample
The sample consists of 92 news articles and 96 UN articles, totaling to 188 articles. In total 12 Goodwill Ambassadors are covered from six different UN organizations.
Structure of the codebook
The first part of the codebook addresses general information about the articles. The second part addresses nine different frames under analysis in this research.
V0. CODERS 1. Ruta Butkute
2. Akvile Puluikyte V1. SOURCE (link)
V2. CRITERIA FULFILMENT
Does the article explicitly mention that the celebrity is a “Goodwill Ambassador” or in any way affiliated with the UN?
If not, please do not code the article. Use “0” for all the following codes. 0. NO
1. YES
V3. DATE OF PUBLICATION (dd/mm/yyyy) V4. CELEBRITY AMBASSADOR
Which is celebrity ambassador is being described? If more than one is mentioned, pick the one that is focused on most.
1. Victoria Beckham 2. Naomi Watts 3. Angelina Jolie 4. Cate Blanchett 5. Anne Hathaway 6. Emma Watson 7. Jack Johnson 8. Ellie Goulding 9. Susan Sarandon 10. Whoopi Goldberg 11. Michael Kors 12. Kate Hudson V5. UN ORGANIZATION
Which UN organization does the Goodwill Ambassador represent? 0. Not mentioned 1. UNHCR 2. UNICEF 3. UN WOMEN 4. UNAIDS 5. UNEP 6. WFT V6. SOURCE
“Press release” must be indicated in the article, otherwise it is not a press release. 1. UN article
2. UN press release 3. News article 4. News press release V7. NEWS MEDIA TYPE
0. Not news media 1. New York Times 2. Star Tribune 3. Los Angeles Times 4. Washington Post 5. USA Today 6. The Guardian 7. BBC News 8. The Independent 9. Sky News
10. Mirror
For the following items, use this answering key to for the codings (Ardevol-Abreu, 2015):
0: The answer to the question from the item is ‘no.’ Therefore, the text does not suggest or mention the aspect or issue to which the item refers.
1: The answer to the question from the item is ‘yes.’ The text suggests or mentions only once the aspect or issue to which the item refers.
2: The answer to the question from the item is ‘yes,’ and more than once. The text suggests or mentions two or more times the aspect or issue to which the item refers.
V8 APOLITICAL FRAME
This frame decontextualizes politics from the story; the political context of a situation is not provided. Instead, the situation can be presented as a moral problem.
V8.1 Does the story provide details about any political situation?
Example: Any mentioning of political policy, conflict, or war should be coded ‘1’. 0 = No
1 = Yes, only once
2 = Yes, and more than once. *reverse code*
V8.2 Does the story position the celebrity with a political view?
Example: Refers to direct quotes from the celebrity about the issue or mentioning the celebrity’s political stand on the issue. For example: “I believe it is every woman’s right to have access to education,” ‘Emma Watson is a feminist’.
0 = No
1 = Yes, only once
*reverse code*
V8.3 Does the story provide moral reasoning for certain actions?
Example: Moral or religious reasoning is indicated by references to religion, God, or normative statements. For example: “it is our duty to protect the most vulnerable” or “It is unethical for Christians to passively watch this situation”.
0 = No
1 = Yes, only once
2 = Yes, and more than once. V9. EXPERT/AUTHORITY FRAME
In this frame the celebrity is portrayed as a specialist of the issue at hand or the cause she/he is representing.
V9.1 Is the celebrity portrayed knowledgeable of the cause she/he is representing?
Example: Indications of knowledge are through statements of credentials (education, humanitarian awards, years of experience in campaigning). Celebrities statements of witnessing something also counts as knowledge, should be coded ‘1’.
Note: Only mentioning awards from professional life in entertainment (Grammy, Oscar) is not sufficient, should be coded ‘0’.
0 = No
1 = Yes, only once
2 = Yes, and more than once.
V9.2 Is there a mention of the celebrity having direct field expertise? Example: Direct field experience refers to the celebrity having travelled and participated in a UN event abroad, usually entailing visiting the beneficiaries. Note: Visits in multiple countries should be coded ‘2’
0 = No
1 = Yes, only once
2 = Yes, and more than once. V10. GAIN FRAME
This frame emphasizes positive outcomes. This frame is mostly concerned with what can be gained in the situation.
V10.1 Does the story revolve around positive outcomes?
Example: An article may stress the positive addition of the celebrity ambassador to the organization and share the impact it will have on its work.
0 = No
1 = Yes, only once
2 = Yes, and more than once. V11. LOSS FRAME
This frame emphasizes negative outcomes of an issue. It is mostly concerned about what is or can be lost as a result of a situation or not taking action.
V11.1 Does the story revolve around negative outcomes?
Example: The article focuses on the adverse situation and the measures that need to be taken in order prevent more adversity. Mentioning of a negative outcome is also coded as ‘1’.
0 = No
1 = Yes, only once
2 = Yes, and more than once. V12. CONFLICT FRAME
