| Abstract [eng] |
The aim of this Master’s thesis is to research the possible impact of mass media on the image of judges and courts in the context of the so-called Jurbarkas criminal case. The case, according to which a minor boy sexually assaulted and attempted to rape a minor girl and disturbed her health, caused a resonance in the society – representatives of the interested parties, politicians, and public figures were present in the public discourse. As the media regularly reported the case in the news, this paper analyses the research problem of the impact of mass media on the perceived image of judges and courts and attempts to prove the null hypothesis that mass media consumers, who read news about the Jurbarkas case, formed their view of judges and courts independently, without being influenced by the articles of news portals. The research methods included the analysis of literature sources, qualitative content analysis of documents (news articles), and an experiment, analysing media framing theory and heuristics, examining the chosen sources of the research, the news portals LRT.lt and DELFI, conducting an impact on the participants of the experiment, and measuring how their opinion of the judges and the judiciary changed after the intervention. The results of the study show that judges and courts were portrayed positively, neutrally, and negatively. Although some news topics overlap, most of them differ, as they emphasise different characteristics of courts and judges, the details of the judicial process, and the significance of the decisions taken. The most divergent topic was the assessment of the sentence imposed on the minor boy: some (experts) argued that such a decision would reduce the risk of relapsing into criminal behavior, while others (public figures) called for a real custodial sentence, thus protecting the victim, and ensuring that the punishment would be equivalent to the crime. The experiment, in which the participants were presented with stimulus material, confirmed the null hypothesis, and the findings suggest that the mass media did not influence the perceived image of judges and the judiciary. However, it should be noted that participants in the experimental groups were more influenced by negative information about judges and courts than by positive information. |
