Framing the AOW debate:bias in Dutch media coverage

In the previous two years, the Dutch political and social landscapes have entered a most sensitive and complex issue: that of the AOW matter. Since Minister of Social Affairs and Employment, Minister Piet Hein Donner, announced the government's intention to raise the legal AOW age from sixty-five to sixty-seven, a most lively debate has risen in the public sphere, involving a vast majority of the Dutch citizens. For our information in regards to this issue, most of us rely on the media to supply us with the necessary know-how and background information, so we may to interpret this information and subsequently perceive an image of the "reality" of the debate. But just how accurate is the image of reality that the media supply for us? This study sets out to find an answer to this very question. Despite professional norms and values that journalists try to adhere to, completely objective news reporting on an issue is virtually impossible. The research in this study will show that news media constantly, conscious- or subconsciously, frame the issue, providing us with something of a perspective on what is happening in the world around us. It is found that the Dutch news coverage of the AOW debate – through a study of four different media outlets (three newspapers and a television news program), divided over two different media – is found to contain a considerate amount of bias in its reporting. Whether through institutional structures or conscious choices, it is found that the public at large are presented with a continuously distorted representation of the reality around them. Which realities and truths are represented depends on which media one would happen to be viewing. In this respect, the media outlets examined here can be seen as definite frames themselves, all offering a different view. Given the conclusion that journalists may try to stimulate an accurate mental representation in the audience mind, it would be useful to explore just how the frames that are offered through the news effect this mental representation. For instance, in a more elaborate research on this particular issue, it would be interesting to find out how the imbalanced coverage of the AOW debate is perceived by the public. In the form of a possible research question: to what extent does biased reporting lead to a biased perception of events? A study of such kind would be able to reveal some more information to us in regards to the amount of agency that people are able to display when forming their perceptions of events and reality.