Analysis of Media’s Attitude in Criminal Cases from the Perspective of Attitude System

Abstract

Culture and ideas are transmitted through news reporting. Despite its assertions of fairness, neutrality, and objectivity, the media consistently portrays one point of view. Taking a news article about the case of a Chinese pregnant woman who fell off a cliff in Thailand as the data, this paper analyzed the media’s attitude toward the involved persons in the criminal case. The paper aims to explore the media’s attitude towards the involved persons in the criminal case of a Chinese pregnant woman who fell off a cliff in Thailand. The result shows that appreciation and judgement are mainly concerned, with which propriety in judgement ranks at the top while the reaction in appreciation ranks second. When describing the wife Wang Nan, propriety is more often used and appreciation ranks second. By judging the injuries of the wife and the hard recovery from injuries of the wife through reaction and judgement and using some evaluative words to describe the injury and state of Mr.Sheppard, the author tries to praise Wang Nan as a very strong person. Although she is badly injured, she is still full of hope for life. When describing the husband, less description is made about him. The evaluated entity is mainly about the habit of gambling with the husband. All the evaluations are negative.