'TV dwells on disaster in covering climate change'

Television news tends to focus on disasters, such as droughts or floods, in covering scientific findings about climate change, an approach that may exaggerate pessimism about the subject, according to a new study.

The review of coverage by leading television news shows in Australia, Brazil, Britain, China, Germany and India finds they most often framed reports about the science of global warming in terms of crisis.

The report, by the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at Oxford University, says disaster scenarios were played up over themes of scientific uncertainty, risks of global warming or opportunities for solving the problems.