Who Gets Reported? Spatial Imbalance, Urban Characteristics in News Coverage Patterns in aspect of Newsworthiness and Community Structure Theory

Abstract

In the early 2020s, during the outbreak of COVID-19, Wuhan, China, the initial epicenter of the virus, became associated with highly negative perceptions. From the outset, the virus was referred to in the news and on social media as the "Wuhan pneumonia" or "Wuhan coronavirus." Subsequently, media coverage of Wuhan was heavily framed around terms such as wildlife markets, virus, lockdowns, bats, and flu, reinforcing negative narratives (Wang & Zheng, 2024). China as a whole was also negatively portrayed, especially as COVID-19 was labeled the "China virus." During the pandemic, racist statements from U.S. political figures, coupled with the high number of Americans deaths, fueled hatred and negative stereotypes against Chinese and broader Asian communities (Bae, 2021). As a result, according to U.S. law enforcement authorities, hate crimes against Asian Americans increased by approximately 150% in the year following the outbreak of COVID-19 (Edmondson & Tankersley, 2021). This example illustrates how news coverage can shape public perception of a place, contributing to prejudice and influencing behavior. This is coming from the fact that news is not a perfect reflection of reality, and news reporting itself is shaped by a wide range of variables including those related to urban and related community characteristics. For this reason, it is crucial to investigate the severity of spatial imbalance in the reception of negative coverage, second, to examine the factors that influence news coverage patterns. In this study, we collected news data from BigKinds on COVID-19, five major violent crimes, fires, and traffic accidents. We applied Gini coefficient to assess the severity of spatial imbalance and visualized the spatial distributions of news coverage per incident. Next, we also applied a Marginalized Two-Part(MTP) model to identify which urban factors influence the news coverage in volume aspects. The results revealed a clear spatial imbalance: number of news articles per incident was disproportionately concentrated in specific areas. In physical, socio-demographic, economic, and functional dimensions, several variables showed statistically significant effects on news coverage pattern across multiple news topics, such as housing price, percentage of support conservative parties, and urban function. In addition, the underlying mechanisms of those variables appeared to include the collective value of organization, newsworthiness, and the author’s bias toward certain areas. Although this study has several limitations, it still holds significance in that it can offer the following insights regarding news exposure of urban: first, spatial imbalance in number of news articles per incident can exist even at the neighborhood (administrative-dong) level, which warrants careful attention; second, it highlights which urban factors should be considered in relation to news exposure. Additionally, by revealing the spatial dimensions and urban characteristics embedded in the selective and unfair gaze of Korean newspapers, this study has implications for ensuring fair news media coverage requires attention not only to individuals and communities, but also to spatial and urban factors.