Framing overseas Chinese students: A comparative analysis of newspaper coverage in mainland China, U.S., and Hong Kong

Within the theoretical framework of framing, this study comparatively content analyzed the portrayals of overseas Chinese students in five newspapers of mainland China, U.S., and Hong Kong. The primary findings reveal that mainland Chinese media favored to frame overseas Chinese students as victims and patriots, while the U.S. and Hong Kong medias framed them as of liberalists and education seekers. Findings also revealed nuances among different media within the same society. This study enriched the extant framing literature through the utilization of consistent versus unique frames, using episodic versus thematic frames as its typological model, and the comparisons of media in different societies as well as different media organizations within a given society.