The power of language in news headlines

In today’s digital era, readers tend to browse news feeds without clicking the headlines and truly engaging with the news stories. It is easy to hang on to the crumbs of information offered by the headlines. In fact, we may even discuss news stories based on the headlines as in the following example:

Did you read about the new Covid-19 restrictions today?
No, I did not. What should we expect?
I don’t know, I just glanced at the headline.

Attractive headlines attract readers

Ideally, news headlines should communicate accurate information with a neutral tone, but in practice, headlines need to be compelling to earn clicks due to economic demands. The attractiveness of the headlines does not only concern tabloid newspapers, but the trend has also emerged in quality journalism.

The language has a crucial role in attracting readers. It can be used to establish creative and playful yet provocative and misleading headlines. People featuring the headlines and the way they are represented also influence attractiveness. For example, authorities and experts can offer reassurance in times of uncertainty. In contrast, the presence of ordinary citizens instead of distant authorities may turn the headline more relatable and evoke sympathy among readers. As a result, the reader is more likely to engage with the whole news story.

Loved ones agonise: Finland’s “unruly” over 70-year-olds resist the COVID-19 measures – “It’s like herding cats” (Ilta-Sanomat, 17 March, 2020)

When comparing the style of news headlines before and after the health crisis, their style remained unchanged. Headlines still needed to balance between passing accurate information to the public and creating punchy headlines. For example, at the beginning of the pandemic, headlines in the Finnish news media contained attitudes and emotions towards different pandemic-related themes. These value statements were strongly linked to the attractive side of headlines, with special appeals to the readership. Thus, headlines were far from neutral.

News headlines and the language used in them are influential communication tools. We not only discuss news stories based on the headlines, but we also decide whether to engage with the whole story based on the attractiveness of the headline. Furthermore, attitudes and emotions expressed through language have the power to shape how we perceive the world.

Jenna Saarni
The writer is a doctoral researcher in digital language studies with an interest in crisis communication. She studies people’s attitudes towards the Covid-19 pandemic and the circulation of information in online news and social media during the health crisis.

Main image: Utsav Srestha / Unsplash

References

Kilgo, D. K. & Sinta, V. (2016). Six things you didn’t know about headline writing: sensationalistic form in viral news content from traditional and digitally native news organizations. International Symposium on Online Journalism, 6(1), 111–130.

Lee, N. Y. (2022). Headlines for summarizing news or attracting readers’ attention? Comparing news headlines in South Korean newspapers with the New York Times. Journalism, 23(4), 892–909.

Thorbjørnsrud, K. & Ytreberg, E. (2020). A human interest economy: The strategic value of turning ordinary people into exemplars in the news media. Journalism Studies, 21(8), 1093–1108.