Steering
Some influence works by shaping what readers come to want without telling them. People often cannot see where a preference came from, and they will defend a choice they never made as their own [1] [2]. In experiments, political views planted this way shifted vote intentions and lasted at least a week [3] [4]. The harm that hidden influence adds is the loss of the ability to trace where a want came from [5].
This page tracks six ways news presentation can steer, so readers can see them. These signals describe what outlets do; they do not change any score. Showing a technique does not cancel its effect: disclosed nudges kept most of their pull in experiments [6] [7]. What it gives back is the ability to see where the influence came from.
Updated . Every measurement is kept in the archive.
Repeated framing
Two- and three-word phrases from each headline, counted over the last 30 days. A phrase is listed when an outlet uses it in at least 3 news reports and at least 4 times as often as the other outlets combined.
| Outlet | Phrases it repeats most, compared with other outlets |
|---|---|
| NPR | election night8 of 317 reports (others 0%) trump arch4 of 317 reports (others 0%) billionaire tax4 of 317 reports (others 0%) midterm losses4 of 317 reports (others 0%) midterm results4 of 317 reports (others 0%) |
| PBS NewsHour | midterm election24 of 348 reports (others 1%) trump administration16 of 348 reports (others 1%) senate midterm election15 of 348 reports (others 0%) wins election12 of 348 reports (others 0%) justice department8 of 348 reports (others 1%) |
| BBC News | vio bolsonaro6 of 262 reports (others 0%) dies aged4 of 262 reports (others 0%) chinese spy4 of 262 reports (others 0%) sir patrick stewart3 of 262 reports (others 0%) florida jet3 of 262 reports (others 0%) |
| The New York Times | justice dept13 of 463 reports (others 0%) trump officials7 of 463 reports (others 0%) york times6 of 463 reports (others 0%) appeals court6 of 463 reports (others 0%) immigration crackdown4 of 463 reports (others 0%) |
| The Guardian | midterm elections31 of 466 reports (others 1%) pete hegseth11 of 466 reports (others 1%) james talarico6 of 466 reports (others 0%) midterms podcast4 of 466 reports (others 0%) early voting4 of 466 reports (others 0%) |
| Politico | nation cartoonists3 of 90 reports (others 0%) |
| The Hill | house seat60 of 1549 reports (others 0%) house race17 of 1549 reports (others 0%) ballot measure12 of 1549 reports (others 0%) house elections11 of 1549 reports (others 0%) governor election9 of 1549 reports (others 0%) |
| Axios | house democrats6 of 328 reports (others 0%) permitting bill5 of 328 reports (others 0%) nvidia ceo5 of 328 reports (others 0%) scoop trump4 of 328 reports (others 0%) peace talks4 of 328 reports (others 0%) |
| CBS News | margaret brennan16 of 397 reports (others 0%) cbs evening15 of 397 reports (others 0%) major garrett15 of 397 reports (others 0%) margaret brennan nov10 of 397 reports (others 0%) senate election7 of 397 reports (others 0%) |
| ABC News | justice department6 of 142 reports (others 1%) |
| NBC News | politics desk16 of 470 reports (others 0%) governor race14 of 470 reports (others 1%) full speech8 of 470 reports (others 0%) adam hamilton8 of 470 reports (others 0%) amy acton8 of 470 reports (others 0%) |
| HuffPost | donald trump35 of 596 reports (others 0%) harry enten11 of 596 reports (others 0%) james carville8 of 596 reports (others 0%) ted cruz8 of 596 reports (others 0%) kaitlan collins5 of 596 reports (others 0%) |
| Fox News | ilhan omar26 of 549 reports (others 1%) trump admin12 of 549 reports (others 0%) decoy dan8 of 549 reports (others 0%) house gop8 of 549 reports (others 0%) gop midterm8 of 549 reports (others 0%) |
| New York Post | ilhan omar23 of 526 reports (others 1%) abdul el-sayed23 of 526 reports (others 1%) nithya raman19 of 526 reports (others 0%) gavin newsom18 of 526 reports (others 0%) xavier becerra14 of 526 reports (others 0%) |
| The Washington Times | justice department11 of 536 reports (others 0%) social media5 of 536 reports (others 0%) democratic challenger4 of 536 reports (others 0%) suspected noncitizens4 of 536 reports (others 0%) voter rolls4 of 536 reports (others 0%) |
| Washington Examiner | joe concha18 of 1053 reports (others 0%) social security17 of 1053 reports (others 0%) social security payments8 of 1053 reports (others 0%) security payments goes8 of 1053 reports (others 0%) november social security8 of 1053 reports (others 0%) |
| The Daily Caller | editor daily rundown10 of 583 reports (others 0%) trump admin9 of 583 reports (others 0%) data center8 of 583 reports (others 0%) wall street6 of 583 reports (others 0%) exclusive ice4 of 583 reports (others 0%) |
| Breitbart | business digest14 of 1407 reports (others 0%) breitbart business digest13 of 1407 reports (others 0%) dem rep13 of 1407 reports (others 0%) charlie kirk13 of 1407 reports (others 0%) flavio bolsonaro11 of 1407 reports (others 0%) |
| The Federalist | cleta mitchell3 of 180 reports (others 0%) mass immigration3 of 180 reports (others 0%) election integrity3 of 180 reports (others 0%) blue tsunami3 of 180 reports (others 0%) decoy dan3 of 180 reports (others 0%) |
| Vox | supreme court7 of 94 reports (others 1%) |
Research: Repeating a claim makes it feel truer, including to people who know the facts [8] [9]. Repeated exposure raises liking most when people do not notice the exposure [10], and liking falls again after many repetitions [11].
Limits: A repeated phrase can be a name or a running story rather than a frame. The list shows the phrases; readers judge what they mean.
Front pages
Each outlet's home page is read every three hours (where its robots.txt allows) and the site records which of that outlet's reports sit highest.
Latest snapshot .
Research: What news puts first sets what people think matters [12] [13]. Ranking order shifted undecided voters in one lab's experiments [14]; an independent test found order alone did not [15], so the stronger case is for showing what is placed at the top.
Limits: Only reports from the feed this site reads can be matched, so a top story from another section shows as not found.
Coverage choices
Stories carried by at least 8 of the 20 active outlets in the last 14 days, and which outlets' feeds did not carry them.
| Outlet | Widely covered stories missing | |
|---|---|---|
| Politico | 53 of 64 | Show
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| The Federalist | 48 of 64 | Show
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| Vox | 48 of 64 | Show
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| ABC News | 41 of 64 | Show
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| BBC News | 34 of 64 | Show
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| Axios | 34 of 64 | Show
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| The New York Times | 28 of 64 | Show
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| The Daily Caller | 24 of 64 | Show
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| Fox News | 22 of 64 | Show
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| NPR | 20 of 64 | Show
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| PBS NewsHour | 19 of 64 | Show
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| CBS News | 16 of 64 | Show
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| New York Post | 16 of 64 | Show
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| Breitbart | 16 of 64 | Show
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| The Guardian | 14 of 64 | Show
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| HuffPost | 14 of 64 | Show
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| NBC News | 12 of 64 | Show
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| The Washington Times | 11 of 64 | Show
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| The Hill | 8 of 64 | Show
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| Washington Examiner | 5 of 64 | Show
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Research: Which stories get covered at all shapes which issues the public sees as important [12] [13].
Limits: The site reads one feed per outlet, often its politics feed. A story missing from that feed may appear elsewhere on the outlet's site.
Gain and loss framing of numbers
Sentences in the outlet's own words that put a figure next to a gain word (saved, protected, added) or a loss word (lost, killed, cut), over the last 30 days. The event pages show each outlet's framing of the same story side by side.
| Outlet | Gain sentences | Loss sentences | Share framed as loss |
|---|---|---|---|
| PBS NewsHour | 36 | 24 | 40% |
| BBC News | 20 | 21 | 51% |
| The New York Times | 6 | 3 | 33% |
| The Guardian | 70 | 59 | 46% |
| The Hill | 9 | 5 | 36% |
| Axios | 35 | 18 | 34% |
| CBS News | 31 | 26 | 46% |
| ABC News | 20 | 10 | 33% |
| NBC News | 30 | 14 | 32% |
| HuffPost | 49 | 28 | 36% |
| Fox News | 58 | 28 | 33% |
| New York Post | 56 | 28 | 33% |
| The Washington Times | 4 | 2 | 33% |
| Washington Examiner | 161 | 69 | 30% |
| The Daily Caller | 104 | 75 | 42% |
| Breitbart | 107 | 70 | 40% |
| The Federalist | 24 | 12 | 33% |
| Vox | 15 | 15 | 50% |
Research: The same outcome told as lives saved or lives lost flips people's choices [16]; a review of 136 papers found the effect holds, at a moderate size [17].
Limits: A loss word can be the plain fact (a storm killed 12 people). The counts show the pattern; they do not judge any sentence.
First figures
The first figure each report gives in its own words. The event pages list them side by side, so readers can see which number each outlet led with.
Research: An early number can pull later judgments toward it [18], though later tests found the effect on what people will pay is weaker than first reported [19].
Limits: The first figure is found by pattern; a date or a page count can occasionally be picked up instead of the story's main number.
Sponsored and paid content
Labels that mark a report as paid for: in its link, in the page's own section data, in the outlet's feed category, or next to the headline. Explicit wording ("paid post", "sponsored content", "paid advertisement") is marked apart from vague wording ("presented by", "in partnership with").
Research: In two studies, fewer than 1 in 10 readers recognized native advertising as advertising [20] [21]. Explicit wording and a label placed in the middle of the article worked best. People resist persuasion once they recognize it [22].
Limits: Ad widgets labeled "Sponsored" and ad slots labeled "Advertisement" appear on most news pages, so those labels are not counted. Paid content with no label at all cannot be found this way.
This site's own design
Design tricks that steer choices are common, and mild ones doubled sign-ups in an experiment without people objecting [23] [24]. Transparency News does not use any of these: pre-checked boxes, countdown timers, fake scarcity ("only 3 left"), confirm-shaming ("No thanks, I don't care about the truth"), hidden costs, forced accounts, or ads dressed as stories. The feed is ordered by how many outlets covered each event and then by time, and that rule is published here.
References
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- Johansson, P., Hall, L., Sikström, S., & Olsson, A. (2005). Failure to detect mismatches between intention and outcome in a simple decision task. Science, 310(5745), 116–119. Source
- Hall, L., Strandberg, T., Pärnamets, P., Lind, A., Tärning, B., & Johansson, P. (2013). How the polls can be both spot on and dead wrong: Using choice blindness to shift political attitudes and voter intentions. PLoS ONE, 8(4), e60554. Source
- Strandberg, T., Sivén, D., Hall, L., Johansson, P., & Pärnamets, P. (2018). False beliefs and confabulation can lead to lasting changes in political attitudes. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 147(9), 1382–1399. Source
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- Loewenstein, G., Bryce, C., Hagmann, D., & Rajpal, S. (2015). Warning: You are about to be nudged. Behavioral Science & Policy, 1(1), 35–42. Source
- Bruns, H., Kantorowicz-Reznichenko, E., Klement, K., Luistro Jonsson, M., & Rahali, B. (2018). Can nudges be transparent and yet effective? Journal of Economic Psychology, 65, 41–59. Source
- Dechêne, A., Stahl, C., Hansen, J., & Wänke, M. (2010). The truth about the truth: A meta-analytic review of the truth effect. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 14(2), 238–257. Source
- Fazio, L. K., Brashier, N. M., Payne, B. K., & Marsh, E. J. (2015). Knowledge does not protect against illusory truth. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 144(5), 993–1002. Source
- Bornstein, R. F. (1989). Exposure and affect: Overview and meta-analysis of research, 1968–1987. Psychological Bulletin, 106(2), 265–289. Source
- Montoya, R. M., Horton, R. S., Vevea, J. L., Citkowicz, M., & Lauber, E. A. (2017). A re-examination of the mere exposure effect: The influence of repeated exposure on recognition, familiarity, and liking. Psychological Bulletin, 143(5), 459–498. Source
- McCombs, M. E., & Shaw, D. L. (1972). The agenda-setting function of mass media. Public Opinion Quarterly, 36(2), 176–187. Source
- Iyengar, S., Peters, M. D., & Kinder, D. R. (1982). Experimental demonstrations of the "not-so-minimal" consequences of television news programs. American Political Science Review, 76(4), 848–858. Source
- Epstein, R., & Robertson, R. E. (2015). The search engine manipulation effect (SEME) and its possible impact on the outcomes of elections. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 112(33), E4512–E4521. Source
- Draws, T., Tintarev, N., Gadiraju, U., Bozzon, A., & Timmermans, B. (2021). This is not what we ordered: Exploring why biased search result rankings affect user attitudes on debated topics. Proceedings of the 44th International ACM SIGIR Conference, 295–305. Source
- Tversky, A., & Kahneman, D. (1981). The framing of decisions and the psychology of choice. Science, 211(4481), 453–458. Source
- Kühberger, A. (1998). The influence of framing on risky decisions: A meta-analysis. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 75(1), 23–55. Source
- Ariely, D., Loewenstein, G., & Prelec, D. (2003). "Coherent arbitrariness": Stable demand curves without stable preferences. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 118(1), 73–106. Source
- Li, L., Maniadis, Z., & Sedikides, C. (2021). Anchoring in economics: A meta-analysis of studies on willingness-to-pay and willingness-to-accept. Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics, 90, 101629. Source
- Wojdynski, B. W., & Evans, N. J. (2016). Going native: Effects of disclosure position and language on the recognition and evaluation of online native advertising. Journal of Advertising, 45(2), 157–168. Source
- Amazeen, M. A., & Wojdynski, B. W. (2019). Reducing native advertising deception: Revisiting the antecedents and consequences of persuasion knowledge in digital news contexts. Mass Communication and Society, 22(2), 222–247. Source
- Friestad, M., & Wright, P. (1994). The persuasion knowledge model: How people cope with persuasion attempts. Journal of Consumer Research, 21(1), 1–31. Source
- Mathur, A., Acar, G., Friedman, M. J., Lucherini, E., Mayer, J., Chetty, M., & Narayanan, A. (2019). Dark patterns at scale: Findings from a crawl of 11K shopping websites. Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction, 3(CSCW), 1–32. Source
- Luguri, J., & Strahilevitz, L. J. (2021). Shining a light on dark patterns. Journal of Legal Analysis, 13(1), 43–109. Source