Threats and harassment of Swedish journalists,10 years on: Coping processes and coping strategies

A (brief) overview of the literature on harassment of journalists

The number of studies of threats to and harassment and abuse of journalists is large and rapidly growing. A cursory Google Scholar search using the terms “threats harassment journalists” reveal more than 50 articles and book chapters published just in 2024–2025 – and these are just the ones in mainstream “top” journals in the field and from edited books from established academic publishers. Our purpose here is not to do a comprehensive literature review (though see Miller, 2023), but merely to provide some context and to position our own research.

There are broadly two main and interlinked themes in harassment research. First, identifying, classifying and categorizing the various forms of harassment, and studying them (a key part of our own work, Löfgren Nilsson and Örnebring (2016), and part of more recent work such as Miller, 2024 as well), for example comparing online and offline harassment (Hart and Sharma, 2024) or studying the frequently sexualized, misogynistic harassment experienced by women journalists (e.g. Chen et al., 2020). Second, studying the various consequences of harassment and how journalists cope with them. This research tends to focus on individual-level consequences, though there are a smaller number of studies looking at consequences and responses more on an organizational or institutional level (e.g. Miller and Lewis, 2022).

Scholars have identified a range of consequences of harassment, for example negative emotional responses (fear, anger, anxiety) that can in turn affect job satisfaction and/or mental health (e.g. Chen et al., 2020; Lee and Park, 2024; Miller, 2024), as well as changes in behavior. Notably, there is a lot of support for the notion that threats and harassment do have a chilling effect, where journalists avoid certain topics because they know these topics will increase the risk of harassment (Grøndahl Larsen, Fadnes & Krøvel, 2020; Löfgren Nilsson and Örnebring, 2016). However, when it comes to studying consequences, scholars are often content to categorize or classify different types of effects found in their empirical material without a strong guiding theoretical framework, a critique also expressed by Miller (2023, pp. 2, 9-10). While there are exceptions (e.g. Miller and Lewis, 2022), by and large the classifications of harassment effects present in the literature are empirically rather than theoretically driven.

We wish to address this gap by framing the consequences of harassment and the various ways of dealing with harassment that journalists express as different forms of coping with stress and enacting coping processes. Viewing harassment, abuse and threats in the workplace as stressors that elicit stress responses has been common when analyzing harassment in other professional fields (e.g. Phillips, 2016; Webster, 2013). Coping mechanisms are often interrelated in complex ways – individuals may mix both adaptive and maladaptive coping, combinations of coping strategies may both strengthen and weaken each other, and so on. Overall, coping is best thought of as an emergent and dynamic process rather than a series of set responses (Stephenson et al., 2016). The framework we present here is intended as a contribution to further theory development in the study of how journalists cope with and respond to threats and harassment.

Some studies of harassment effects among journalists have used the notion of coping to analyze harassment responses (e.g. Bhat, 2024; Ivask et al., 2024), though these studies generally use the terms “coping” and “coping strategies” in an everyday language sense, listing various coping responses and behaviors found in the data without systematizing them. This research does provide valuable insights into recurring coping behaviors among journalists – “positive or wishful thinking; self-control; talking to colleagues, friends, and family members; disassociation and detachment; denial and avoidance; flight behaviour; purging emotions; black humour; exercise and other physical activities; or substance abuse”, according to a list in Ivask et al., (2024) (p. 2102). Bhat (2024) particularly highlights the importance of coping based on collective strategy (building support networks) alongside the more individual response “strategic social media disconnection” (Bhat, 2024, p. 347-8; NB that Ivask, 2025, p. 1012 mentions the reverse strategy, i.e. doing more online research on one’s harassers).

Kim and Shin (2025a) add a more systematic theoretical framework for analyzing harassment by using Lazarus and Folkman’s (1984) framework for analyzing and categorizing coping mechanisms and finds that so-called emotion-focused coping mechanisms were the most common among the journalists they interviewed. They suggest that the only practicable way for journalists to deal with pervasive hate (“journalism-hate as social affect”) is essentially to normalize abuse and harassment.

Theoretical framework: Harassment, stress and coping

Following Miller (2023), we define harassment in the context of journalism as “… unwanted abusive behaviors” which “…can include sexual and non-sexual harassment, as well as verbal and physical harassment” and includes “… a variety of abuse that may be mild or extreme” (Miller, 2023, p. 1233). Given this definition, it is reasonable to assume that harassment will frequently cause stress for journalists, and reactions to/consequences of harassment can be understood within a framework of stress and coping.

The most well-known and influential transactional theory of stress and coping is that of psychologists Richard S. Lazarus and Susan Folkman. Their theory states that people constantly appraise their environment, and when this cognitive appraisal results in defining a certain stimulus or set of stimuli as challenging or potentially harmful (i.e. as stressors), the individual employs various types of coping strategies. These coping strategies then elicit a feedback loop – either they are successful in reducing stress and negative emotion, which leads to a more positive cognitive appraisal, and so on; or they are unsuccessful, which increases stress and generates a more negative cognitive appraisal (Lazarus, 1990; Lazarus and Folkman, 1984). While it has not always been used in this way, Lazarus & Folkman’s model is at heart process oriented, i.e. coping is a dynamic process where coping strategies interact, can strengthen or weaken each other, and where strategy choices may change and strategies develop over time. It has thus influenced other scholars who also view coping as dynamic, where one influential complementary model has been developed by Latack et al., (1995). Their work specifically deals with coping with job loss but can and has been adapted for studying coping with other stressful events and phenomena in a workplace setting. Latack, Kinicki & Prussia’s definition of coping as “a purposive process through which people attempt to maintain equilibrium in various facets of their lives (i.e. economic, psychological, physiological, and social)” (p. 314) works equally well for describing coping with threats and harassment, for example.

Latack, Kinicki & Prussia further highlight the processual aspects of coping by adding a set of intervening factors between the appraisal phase of coping (i.e. when the individual analyzes various aspects of the stress he or she is put under) and the choice of coping strategy, i.e. coping goals (what kind of mitigation or form of equilibrium is it the individual actually wants to achieve); coping resources (what additional help or support is available to the individual; these factors can be both individual and social/organizational); and coping efficacy (self-belief in the appropriateness and efficiency of various coping strategies) (pp. 317-319). These intervening factors will then in turn affect what type or types of coping strategies are used by the individual, as well as the nature of any feedback loops created.

Coping strategies in turn can be divided into problem-focused and emotion-focused (Lazarus and Folkman, 1984). Problem-focused coping means trying to manage or control the stressor and/or the environment giving rise to the stressor in some way, whereas emotion-focused coping means regulating the (negative) emotions caused by the stressful situation. A lot of research has generally considered problem-focused coping to be more “effective” in that it has been associated with psychological well-being and quality of life, though it must be pointed out that Lazarus and Folkman does not propose that either type is inherently effective or ineffective, emphasizing the situational, interactive and complex nature of stress responses.

Critics have pointed out that this binary definition may be insufficient, and several scholars have therefore suggested alternative taxonomies of coping strategies. Edwards (1992), for example, proposed five types of coping strategy: changing the situation; symptom reduction; avoidance; accommodation (i.e. adjusting one’s emotions to better fit the situation); and devaluation (i.e. minimizing the importance and/or impact of one’s own reaction), and there are many other alternative classifications out there (Duhachek and Oakley, 2007).

In light of these critiques, Lazarus and Folkman has revised the original classification to also include meaning-focused coping, which refers to drawing on individual values, beliefs, and goals in order to ascribe positive meaning to stressors and highlight the positive effects of stress (such as when journalists see harassment as an indication that they are properly fulfilling their professional-democratic role, as suggested by Hughes et al., 2024). Furthermore, Folkman and others have also acknowledged the importance of future-oriented or future-focused coping, i.e. anticipating stressors in advance and planning coping strategies accordingly (see Folkman and Moskowitz, 2004). In our analysis, we will use this revised categorization based on Lazarus’s and Folkman’s work, dividing coping strategies into problem-focused, emotion-focused, meaning-focused, and future-focused. We also take an explicitly process-oriented perspective on coping (as also suggested by Lazarus & Folkman, and refined by Latack, Kinicki & Prussia), where we also attempt to locate intervening factors (goals, resources, and efficacy) affecting the choice of, and interaction between, chosen coping strategies. The goal is to contribute to a more dynamic understanding of journalists’ coping with threats and harassment – we want not only to study the “what” of coping with harassment, but also the “how” (Latack, Kinicki & Prussia, p. 314).

New forms of harassment and harassers

Interviewees highlight two specific new harassment strategies: anonymous reports to the social authorities and lawsuits. Briefly, the legal context in Sweden allows for making anonymous reports concerning child welfare to social service authorities. One interviewee describes the indignity of being reported to social services:

I wrote about this guy/…/. And then the social services in my hometown call me because a report of concern has been received and this report is from some Anna Lena who has seen how the children are suffering and how I am lying drunk outside my door /…/ Then they have to do a preliminary assessment. And that was the most humiliating thing I have ever experienced, I felt so powerless, so questioned, so scared. It was just so disgusting bringing my kids into this. (Annika).

Libel lawsuits against journalists in Sweden are frequently reported on and supported by “The libel ombudsman”, who despite the official-sounding name is a private individual on the political right who maintains a social media presence where he supports libel lawsuits against journalists he considers to be left-wing extremists. One interviewee describes how being targeted by this “libel ombudsman” can be quite stressful:

To me, it is far-fetched to equate a critical article with slander. I was never really worried about being convicted, still it’s stressful, I lost working time and there was a lot of attention in the media about this, which of course started a new hate storm and new threats. /…/ I'm so upset and pissed off about this development. (Oskar)

Interviewees overall identified the group identity of their most frequent harassers as a) right-wing extremists and racists, and b) organized crime – which is entirely in line with the results of an earlier survey study by one of the authors (Löfgren Nilsson, 2017). In addition, our interviewees mention two other identifiable “groups” of harassers – the mentally ill, and politicians and opinion leaders (almost always on the political right). Many interviewees are disappointed and upset with what they experience as a systematic delegitimizing strategy from right-wing politicians, lobby groups and other officials:

[Y]ou could demand a little more from official representatives, that is, those who are somewhat standard-bearers in the debate /…/ people in leading positions. (Daniel)

This pattern fits with many other studies also showing that (mainly right-wing) politicians are an increasingly common source of statements legitimizing harassment and delegitimizing journalists, if not necessarily harassing journalists directly (e.g. Rees, 2023). The perception of our interviewees is that right-wing politicians have intensified their anti-media, anti-journalism rhetoric in the past decade.

Appraisal

The first step in any coping process is appraisal, i.e. making a judgment of the seriousness of the stressor(s) and possibly also of one’s general environment and circumstances. An apparent paradox is that the investigative reporters are better equipped to evaluate threats (due both to their training and to their generally greater experience of threats and harassment), and at the same time they are the most likely to point out harassment “comes with the territory” and normalize it (i.e. appraise threats as generally unimportant).

Interviewees frequently report that appraisal becomes constant and continuous. Many are constantly aware of how they move and behave in public spaces. They avoid crowds or packed restaurants:

I prefer to have an empty table between me and other guests and constantly look over my shoulders. (Anders)

Such behaviors are quite normalized:

I haven't left my job for one single day, and it's been ten years, without checking to make sure no one is following me. And this really sounds like it must be super hard, but it's a bit like brushing your teeth. (Daniel)

Sometimes a distinct appraisal of whether a situation merits a formal response (e.g. reporting the threat to the police) occurs. This type of appraisal is often a collective activity (particularly discussing with editorial leadership). As part of this appraisal, some interviewees (again, primarily those working as investigative journalists) argue that taking legal action may be problematic from a journalistic ethics perspective:

Well, I don’t see how I can be a part in a case, a witness, and then go on investigating this person or group. So, I prefer not to and sometimes keep quiet about threats since it’s our newspapers policy to report to the police. (Ann-Sofie)

While Ann-Sofie thus may well appraise a particular instance of harassment as serious, she would still decide not to pursue an active counterstrategy as she considers this leading to a potential conflict of interest.

Since many of our interviewees have long and extensive experience of being harassed, it is often difficult to identify a distinct appraisal step; rather (as Lazarus & Folkman also hint at), cognitive appraisal of one’s situation is constant – which can in itself lead to considerable stress. In our analysis, the “normalization” of threats and harassment noted by us and many other scholars is something that belongs mostly to the appraisal step of coping: journalists evaluate many types of harassment as a kind of background noise, an inevitable part of work.

Coping goals, coping resources, and coping efficacy

As noted, Latack et al. (1995) suggest that the choice of coping strategy (to the extent that it is a conscious, rational choice) after appraisal is affected by the intervening factors of coping goals, coping resources, and coping efficacy.

Coping strategies

Our interviewees take a range of actions to protect themselves and reduce stress, anxiety and fear. The strategies used and actions taken are related to the coping goal most relevant for the individual in the given situation.

When an interviewee’s goal is to mitigate/eliminate stress, they mostly use emotion-focused and/or meaning-focused coping strategies. We classify most strategies used to “get control” as emotion-focused, as interviewees freely admit that these are strategies they use to reduce anxiety, even as they are not sure they work to address the underlying problem. Several interviewees trawl social media platforms to find out what is said about them:

I follow it myself regularly and do various searches to see, to also understand, the atmosphere and if it is starting to get serious. (Mathias)

Some of our investigative journalists have acquired sources within closed online networks and groups who warn them if there are discussions about them or emerging threats, a practice that could also be classified as problem-focused (though our empirical material contains no confirmation of whether using such sources actually works to mitigate threats).

Another emotion-focused coping strategy used to mitigate stress is venting, i.e. simply talking to colleagues and sometimes management about what they are experiencing and feeling:

Yes, what else do we do? We talk about when it's hard, because it doesn't just have to be threats, it can be people behaving unreasonably in a lot of ways, absolutely. That, it's OK that it's hard. That it’s OK to be afraid. /…/ And the support from the news editor is great. (Jessica)

Emotional coping does reduce stress when your feelings and fears are recognized, though does not always lead to the sense of control and safety – and does not solve the actual problem.

Another form of emotion-focused coping is trying to maintain a clear borderline between professional identity and private life. This eases the burden and anxiety for some interviewees:

I think that an important thing is that as a normal professional, you separate the roles, that the one who is attacked, it is not the private person it’s what I symbolize/…/ It has been useful to think like that, so you can leave that persona at work a little bit when you go home. (Daniel)

A third way to cope with emotions is to engage with the audience – including harassers. This is also described as a way of “getting control” by being active rather than reactive. Only a few of the interviewees report engaging in this manner:

I respond to most except the obviously disgusting ones. And if they are unpleasant, I can be unpleasant back. But it doesn't benefit us to strangle communication. And it’s a way for me to explain my role as a journalist. (Evelina)

Harassers experienced as “trolls” or “pure haters” do not merit a response, according to interviewees. Even those interviewees that do respond to harassment make clear that there must be something of substance worth responding to (for example explaining obvious misconceptions about journalistic work), no matter how abusive the comments might be. In the case of more personal attacks such as stalking and sexual abuse, no interviewee reports responding – it is seen as pointless and potentially encouraging more harassment:

What am I supposed to answer? No, I’m not fat and sexually unsatisfied? (Sara)

When mobilizing professionalism and professional pride as coping resources, the interviewees are engaging in a meaning-focused coping strategy. Being proud of your work and feeling like you make a difference keeps our interviewees going. Some of the interviewees also mention that harassment triggers a competitive instinct in them, another aspect of meaning-focused coping:

Well, I will never let them win and beat me, I’m the good guy on the right side, the side of the angels (laughter), they are not. (Susanne)

However, as explained by one of the most frequently harassed journalists in the sample, meaning-focused coping does not help in all situations:

But it’s this pointless harassment that tires me the most. /…/ You know, it gets under your skin, invades your privacy, makes you feel unsafe, especially threats about sexual violence. (Annika)

When an interviewee’s main goal is mitigating/eliminating harassment, the coping strategies used are more often problem-focused or future-focused. The first and most common type of problem-focused coping strategy – used by all types of journalists – is restricting or entirely avoiding your use of social media both for personal and professional purposes. In this way, you are simply not reached by many harassment attempts (e.g. harassment via online comments) and online threats become less viable for perpetrators.

The investigative journalists in the sample again demonstrated higher awareness and more in-depth knowledge about suitable preventative and mitigating strategies than general reporters and thus had a greater repertoire of problem-focused strategies. Many use personal alarms, have relatively advanced security systems installed in their home, or have protected personal data. The latter is a form of legal support available in Sweden where your personal data is protected by court order (i.e. your names and personal details are not searchable in databases where such details would normally be publicly available). This has quite severe consequences in everyday life: it becomes very complicated to start your own company, get a bank loan, or even buy a mobile phone:

Well, it’s like living in Saudi Arabia, I had to bring my husband to get a mobile phone and a subscription. (Jessica)

This is thus a relatively rarely used resource, mostly used by those journalists who are subjected to credible threats to their own life and the lives of their family members. Two journalists have in fact revoked such protection due to the consequences in private life and because they consider it inefficient:

Well, they can always get to you if they want, it's just a false sense of security. (Jessica)

The strategies mentioned above could conceivably also be categorized as future-focused (since interviewees report engaging in these activities to mitigate future threats and harassment), but since all the interviewees who mentioned using them also chose them because of being harassed, we have classified them as problem-focused. Strategies that can more easily be classified as future-focused are, for example, attending security courses and engaging in more active and formal risk calculations.

Interviewees who have attended security courses/education are highly appreciative of them and report an increased sense of control, especially when moving around in public, and in general mitigating and handling risks. Engaging in active risk calculation is another future-focused coping strategy, as it is oriented towards foreseeing and minimizing risks. Interviewees emphasize that they never have cancelled a job due to risk, but they do report having to change working routines such as changing plans for interviews, changing meeting locations, having a colleague accompanying you to a meeting or interview, and adding many reporters to an article byline (in order to avoid a single journalist becoming the target of threats). Risk calculation may also include planning ahead for moving in case that may be necessary following publication of a particular story. These kinds of risk calculations and mitigation are often done in the newsroom together with colleagues and management. “Regular” reporters do not mention such collective risk calculations as often. They seem to be largely left on their own, and any actions taken by management happen post-publication.

Feedback loops

Negative feedback loops in the coping process are more common than positive ones among the journalists in our sample. Negative feedback loops occur when coping strategies (of any type) do not appear effective; journalists then engage in self-censorship as a way of escaping threats and harassment. Our 2016 study found that about one third of Swedish journalists had been practicing self-censorship in one way or another (Löfgren Nilsson and Örnebring, 2016) Most of the interviewees in this study claim that they have never hesitated to do their job, yet there are some exceptions. One interviewee mentioned refraining from investigating a particular criminal gang, and in two cases refraining from publishing a story, both direct results of threats:

They threatened me and my kids, my kids were young and I did not dare to put them at risk. (Jesper)

Others describe self-censorship in a more general way:

So I've become a lot more on my guard, I think, in general. Not exposing myself to such risks, it's a form of self-censorship, or maybe not self-censorship, but shying away from certain topics. (Mathias)

For two interviewees, the negative feedback loop had become so overwhelming that one had left journalism, and one was planning to do so:

It’s when I'm the most tired and I think is it worth all this, especially with investigative journalism. /…/ I can get so tired that you're going to get so much crap, that you're going to be so hated. And then it's a bit private too, that it’s so complicated to live with protected personal data. (Mathias)

Ours is not a representative sample, but it is important to note that (as showed by other studies) harassment really “works” (from the harasser’s point of view) in some instances: determined harassers can get a journalist to consider or even actually leaving the profession.

Some emotion-focused coping strategies do engender a limited positive feedback loop, where some interviewees report increased feelings of control and less anxiety when using “get control”-type strategies, which in turn gives reinforces resilience. One still wonders how sustainable this loop is in the long term. Stronger positive feedback loops are almost solely tied to problem-focused and future-focused coping strategies – if the journalist can mitigate or hinder threats and harassment, there are fewer reasons to be anxious in the future, which in turn leads to greater well-being, and so on. Our qualitative study thus supports quantitative studies emphasizing problem-focused over emotion-focused coping.

There is also an important feedback interaction where future-focused coping strategies are linked to problem-focused ones, i.e. engaging in predictive and preventative practices in order to mitigate future problems and issues. Besides this, all interviewees basically demonstrate using all coping strategies to various degrees, and frequently freely admit that emotion-focused strategies may not address the actual problem yet still make them feel better.

Ten years on – similarities, differences, and final reflections

Two new types of harassment have occurred in Sweden recently - anonymous reports to the social authorities and lawsuits. The current development in Sweden shows similarities to other Western democracies, since many of our interviewees experience a systematic delegitimizing strategy from right-wing politicians, lobby groups and other officials. A recent study supports their experiences, showing that such media delegitimization is most likely to come from the political right, and the Moderate Party and the Sweden Democrats in particular (Limingai and Strömbäck, 2023). Some of our interviewees are worried and upset about this development and claim (without giving any concrete examples) that politicians’ delegitimizing strategies spill over to other contexts.

Our respondents report their impression that there are more open conversations about mental health and the toll of threats and harassment in newsrooms today than there were ten years ago. Such conversations, without the fear of stigmatization or perceptions of weakness, can go a long way towards fostering a healthy workforce and supporting victims of threats and harassment. All interviewees report using venting as an emotion-focused coping strategy and thus are not suffering in silence (like some journalists reported doing in our 2016 survey). However, it is important to note that some interviewees still feel alone.

The sexual harassment affecting women journalists needs more scholarly attention. We acknowledge that the small sample size of our study makes it difficult to discuss gender differences in experiences in more detail and with greater representativity, which is a weakness. We do note that women journalists sometimes feel embarrassed and ashamed to talk about threats and harassment, due to its frequently sexual nature. Greater awareness of sexual harassment and its implications, and an improvement of occupational health care to better meet the needs of journalists, would help journalists dealing with threats and harassment.

Another issue for future research is to clarify how coping strategies not only change but possibly are redefined in the face of harassment as a pervasive “social affect” as described by Kim and Shin (2025b). Our results could indicate that coping no longer should be seen as a set of individual responses to likewise individual events but rather as a process where coping strategies are continuously tested, developed, integrated with other coping strategies, possibly discarded, and so on – i.e. coping could possibly be seen as a continuous state more than individual responses to discrete events. This would be a truly depressing development that would also point to the need for more direct institutional interventions (from both employers and governments) to support journalists.