Naming the Suspects in Terrorist Attacks: A Media Priming Analysis of the Second-Day News Coverage of the London Bombings in 12 Newspapers from Four Nations

Based on the psychological model of media priming, this study examines all the second-day reports of the London bombings (July 7, 2005) in 12 major newspapers from China, Egypt, Switzerland, and the United States. The results show that in the immediate aftermath of the London bombings, most of the newspapers reported by speculating about the attack using largely ambiguous quotes to report on the suspects: specifically al-Qaeda. British intelligence officials later admit that the suspects are homegrown. The phenomenon of media priming is thus proven among the journalists when they reported the attacks as breaking news. This study should shed light on how journalists make decisions when covering events where full information is not immediately available. Further, this study discusses the political and cultural differences that can attribute to the differences in coverage between the 4 countries, and offers ideas of journalism education that may help to better prepare journalists for covering such traumatic events.