Cable news airs more inaccurate than accurate statements about abortion, according to a Media Matters survey, Vox reports.
The survey follows an earlier Vox report that highlighted how many U.S. residents are misinformed about abortion.
Survey details
For the Media Matters survey, researchers reviewed evening and primetime news programs that aired on CNN, Fox News or MSNBC between Jan. 1, 2015, and March 6, 2016. They identified 688 segments that included 1,544 appearances by 432 individuals involving significant discussion about abortion-related topics.
The researchers assessed whether the speakers said they opposed or supported abortion rights, as well as whether their comments supported or opposed abortion rights. Specifically, the researchers examined the accuracy of speakers' comments regarding four major news topics, including: the use of federal funding for abortion, which is not allowed in most cases; the misconception that birth control is an abortifacient; the debunked claim, perpetuated by the Center for Medical Progress' misleading video series, that Planned Parenthood profits from its fetal tissue donation program; and the notion that the CMP videos meet standards of journalism (Crockett, Vox, 6/3).
Key findings
The researchers found that both CNN and Fox News aired a greater number of inaccurate statements than accurate statements on the four topics. On Fox News, 158 of the statements were accurate while 705 were inaccurate. CNN aired 43 accurate statements and 54 inaccurate statements.
On MSNBC, 87 statements were accurate while 37 were not (Larris/Kann, Media Matters survey, 6/1).
Further, the researchers noted that both Fox News and CNN had more speakers who opposed abortion rights than speakers who supported abortion rights. MSNBC had more speakers who supported abortion rights, but all of the networks had more male speakers on the abortion topics than female speakers.
In addition, the survey found that antiabortion-rights topics received more coverage than topics in favor of abortion rights, Vox reports. For instance, Media Matters found only eight segments on financial barriers to abortion care access. Moreover, while there was a marked increase in violence against abortion providers last year, the topic received little attention outside of coverage of a shooting in Colorado in November.
The survey also noted that the misleading videos targeting Planned Parenthood received considerable media attention for several months. Vox reports that this meant abortion-rights supporters had to spend time addressing the misconceptions that could otherwise be spent on other abortion-rights topics (Vox, 6/3).
