Femicide media coverage and violence reporting behavior

Abstract

This paper explores the effect of publicizing femicide cases on the media upon the violence reporting behavior of female victims. I hypothesize that the probability of reporting the aggressor depends on whether the victim resides in a province that receives media coverage of femicides. The empirical analysis uses violence reports registered by the All-women justice centers in Peru and a unique dataset that includes the exact date of femicides and its publication on the media between 2017 and 2018. I exploit the spatial variation of media coverage as well as the differences in the timing of publication of femicides to measure the impact on the number of violence reports. I find a significant effect of femicide news coverage on the reporting behavior. In particular, the publication of at least one femicide on the media increases the number of physical violence reports by 11.5% over the sample mean. The dynamics of the relationship between femicide media coverage and the number of violence reports depict that femicide coverage increases the reports on the week of publication but has no effect on the number of reports in subsequent weeks. My results are robust to a variety of alternative specifications. Based on this evidence, I argue that the media can have a sizeable social impact on the reporting behavior by (i) depicting relevant information of the justice centers or police and (ii) galvanizing negative warning cues that raise women’s demand for justice services.