Different pathways to identify moral framing from media content: A response to Hopp and Weber

ABSTRACT

Moral framing is a mobilizing strategy in digital activism to raise awareness of a social issue. This essay discussed the strengths and weaknesses of multiple methods of extracting moral framing from media content. Two issues were highlighted from crowd-coding and automated coding using computational approaches: context sensitivity and the handling of coding discrepancies. We compared results from manual content coding and automated analysis using the eMFD, urging scholars to incorporate multiple methods to uncover the meanings behind each moral value. We argued that crowdcoding, computational approaches and manual coding are not exclusive of one another, and encouraged scholars to diversify their methodological toolbox and choose what to use based on the research context.

KEYWORDS:

• Moral framing
• content analysis
• moral foundation theory
• digital activism

View addendum:

Moral framing and information virality in social movements: A case study of #HongKongPoliceBrutality

Rejoinder: How methodological decisions impact the validity of moral content analyses

This article refers to:

Reflections on extracting moral foundations from media content