Factors Influencing a Journalist's Gatekeeping Role in the Coverage of Traumatic Incidents in Pakistan.

This research study is designed to understand reporting traumatic incidents in Pakistani media and the individual level factors that influence a journalist's decision while covering a traumatic incident and his/her decision of selecting information to include in or exclude from news. This study uses a qualitative research design to analyze the research question. The researcher used in-depth interviews with journalists in Peshawar and Tribal Districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Thirty journalists were recruited (news reporters, editors and photographers) working for media (print, broadcast and online), whose primary beat is 'crime' or "violent events" along with other beats. The participants of the study were selected by purposive and snowball sampling techniques. Thematic Analysis as a method was used to analyze the data, i.e., interviews with journalists. The data was examined through the lens of the Hierarchy of Influences Model (HOI), which is an extension of the Gatekeeping Theory. The findings show that education, training, experience, focus on crime and conflict, newsworthiness of the story, self-promotion, and Job security influence a journalist's decision while covering a traumatic incident in Pakistani media. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]