China's Official Framing of Religion and Its Influence on Young Chinese Students: A Partial Testing of the Process Model of Framing in a Special Media Environment

Using a multiple-method approach that combines content analysis and experiment, this study tested the first three steps of the process model of framing in China's specific media environment, in which media have a special relationship with the ruling group and the audiences. The study supports the first two steps of the process model and found that the ruling group's view of religion greatly shapes the media's framing of religion, which influences the audiences’ individual framing. The third step that predicts a correlation between the audiences’ individual framing and their individual political attitude, however, is not supported. An interesting phenomenon appeared: students not exposed to the newspaper articles tended more to support the government's dealing with religion as a political issue than did those exposed to one or two newspaper articles.