LAUSR

Background Crashes between bicyclists/vehicles and pedestrians/vehicles are events that elicit emotions, opinions and values about what ought to be the “best” policy intervention. Several instruments, or policy tools, can be utilized to create healthy, livable transportation environments that support the needs of bicyclists and pedestrians along with motorists. However, in the policy decision-making realm, narratives and the underlying values become intertwined with facts to influence problem definition and produce an emphasis on certain types of tools to address safety. The details, reports, accusations and opinions expressed surrounding crashes are important as they shape the policy narrative that defines the event. Thus, casting bicyclists and pedestrians as “guilty-victims” may suggest a propensity to select one set of policy tools and this may be different than the policy tools selected if the target population is cast as “innocent victims.” This study investigates media coverage rates and the factors contributing to the emergence of a victim versus a villain narrative in fatal bicyclist and pedestrian crashes. Methods The research design uses a mixed-methods design that utilizes quantitative techniques to analyze qualitative, coded data. The study uses media accounts, including traditional print sources, television, and social media, as the primary data source. The analysis uses the content of different media sources to generate the qualitative, coded independent variable, Blame-the-victim. The data is collected for bicycle and pedestrian fatality crashes with media reports from 12 states in four different regions from 2004–2015. The study compares media reporting and villain versus victim characterization as variables of interest when comparing differences between the bicyclist and pedestrian crashes, and regions in the United States. Results While the victim narrative appears more prevalent in crashes, the media accounts portray pedestrians as victims at a significantly higher rate than bicyclists who are more frequently portrayed as villains. Overall, neither bicyclist nor pedestrian crashes regularly appear in media accounts; however, the media reporting of pedestrian crashes occurs significantly more often as a proportion of total fatal crashes than bicyclist crashes. Conclusions The overall coverage in media appears rather low; eight of the sampled states have media accounts for fewer than 2% of bicycle fatalities, and five states have media accounts for fewer than 3% of pedestrian fatalities. This infrequent coverage appears to indicate a lack of public engagement/concern regarding bicycle and pedestrian deaths. Future research will explore the impact of characterizing the victim as guilty/innocent on policies and infrastructure improvements.