Influence of Media on Public Perceptions: Case Study of Pakistan’s Nuclear Program

Media today has a major role to play in perception building. Whatever is said and written in the media has an impact on the readership. Ever since Pakistan commenced its military nuclear program, it has been under the scrutiny of the international media, especially media in the U.S. Some of the comments in the U.S. media pertain to Pakistan's nuclear proliferation history; others speculate on its safety and security and promote concerns of this technology falling in the wrong hands. Lastly, apprehensions about Pakistan being the fastest growing nuclear program in the world have also gained traction. Furthermore, overlaid to these alleged fears are the assertions that Pakistan's nuclear decision making is dominated by the military. The purpose of this research is to inquire the public perceptions this misinformation may built to falsely portray Pakistan's role in the nuclear non-proliferation. A wide range of samples from the opinion and editorial sections of the U.S. newspaper The New York Times' (NYT) is researched upon. The conclusion drawn from this research is that majority of the opinions published in the NYT focus primarily on disseminating negative perceptions about Pakistan's nuclear program and fails to highlight the positive steps that Pakistan has taken. This type of selective media reporting embeds doubts in the minds of the U.S. public which may mislead the policy makers. Their reliance on preconceived notions about Pakistan could be detrimental. There is a need to change the trajectory of negative reporting about the Pakistani nuclear program in the international media. This can be achieved by working with the U.S. at the government, media and public levels