When news stories are paid for and/or written by commercial entities, or when news stories are selected or slanted to please advertisers or corporate content
Stories are published and promoted that promote fear, anger, or excitement. Bias in favor of the exceptional over the ordinary can give the impression that rare events are more common or serious than common events. Sensationalist titles may also be called clickbait and often do not accurately reflect the content of the article.
Images are selected that skew the readers perception of the events reported or story's overall importance.
Issues and events are reported as being more fair and balanced than evidence suggests; Opposing viewpoints are given equal time and treatment even if there is more evidence to support one viewpoint.
News outlets rely on current and fresh content. Reports may report on emerging events before gathering all relevant information. Additionally, articles may imply that an event is new or unique (and thus notable) without addressing related past events.
Articles may omit information that is important to a full understanding of the issue being discussed. Such information is may be omitted to skew the reader's perception of an event or issue. Omission bias is often difficult to notice unless you read a number of articles cover the same issue from a variety of perspectives.
Reporter may use words with positive or negative connotations to evoke an emotional response in readers.
Reports may offer analysis or suggest solutions that they are not qualified to give. This may imply endorsement of and idea or practice.
This content inspired and informed by the following resources: Uncover Media Bias (Monona Grove High School); Identifying Bias (UW - Green Bay Libraries); Media Bias (Wikipedia)
Gatekeeping -- A concept in sociology and social psychology based on functions regulating access to information, goods, services, and to those in power within hierarchical social structures and organizations.
Hyperbole -- A figure of speech involving emphatic exaggeration or overstatement, sometimes based on irony and/or for comic effect. Sensational reporting often employs hyperbole (informally called hype).
Framing -- The way in which individuals and the mass media turn the flow of everyday life into narrative events; The role of particular techniques and devices employed in representations as a means of constraining interpretation
Neutrality -- An ideal of representing (some aspect of) reality purely objectively, without distortion or bias; In journalism, an ethical ideal of not taking sides or expressing a personal opinion, and keeping an open mind
Objectivity -- Making and interpreting verifiable observations about the world without researcher bias: the goal of scientific research based on objectivism; In journalism (particularly in public-service broadcasting), a professional ideal or norm in factual reporting involving the related goals of accuracy, truthfulness, impartiality, neutrality, disinterestedness, and the avoidance of conscious bias or distortion.
Satire -- A genre in literature, film, and other media which is used to deflate, ridicule, and censure the perceived folly or immorality of what is represented. Tools include irony, sarcasm, wit, caricature, exaggeration, distortion, and parody.
Spin -- Selectively creating narratives and frames for events so that those particular definitions of situations are privileged which best serve the client’s interests.
Definitions from Chandler, D., & Munday, R. (2020). A dictionary of media and communication. Oxford: Oxford University Press, Incorporated.