Analysis of Directing Recipientsʼ Attention Through the Cover Design of Selected Polish Opinion Weeklies

Miłosz Babecki; Adam Błaszczok

doi:10.18290/rns2026.0023

Published : 2026-06-09

No. Online First

Analysis of Directing Recipientsʼ Attention Through the Cover Design of Selected Polish Opinion Weeklies

dr hab. Miłosz Babecki

https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9749-9351

Dr Adam Błaszczok

https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9874-6983

DOI: https://doi.org/10.18290/rns2026.0023

Abstract

Contemporary print media face the challenge of capturing and sustaining audience attention in an era of near-instant communication. The magazine cover has become a crucial element of communication strategy, designed to attract attention and evoke emotions. In this paper we examine the role of covers in publisher–reader communication, by analysing selected Polish opinion weeklies, Newsweek Polska, Polityka, and Wprost. We focus on variables influencing the perception of political communication and its actors. Politicians are often depicted in negatively charged poses, with microexpressions conveying core emotions. These function as elements of visual rhetoric, where microexpressions operate as visual arguments. Notably, such expressions are sometimes digitally constructed. The study demonstrates that nowadays technical means enable the management of cognitive and affective responses. As a result, publishers can influence readers’ emotions and attitudes by emphasising or fabricating gestures, postures, and emotional expressions of political figures.

Keywords:

directing attention, microexpressions, visual rhetoric, weeklies, press, capturing attention, public opinion, shaping opinion

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Babecki, M., & Błaszczok, A. (2026). Analysis of Directing Recipientsʼ Attention Through the Cover Design of Selected Polish Opinion Weeklies. Roczniki Nauk Społecznych, (Online First). https://doi.org/10.18290/rns2026.0023

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dr hab. Miłosz Babecki

milosz.babecki@uwm.edu.pl
https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9749-9351

Affiliation:

Institute of Journalism and Social Communication, University of Warmia and Mazury in Olsztyn Poland

Bio Statement (e.g., department and rank)

Miłosz Babecki – Assistant Professor at the Institute of Journalism and Social Communication at the University of Warmia and Mazury in Olsztyn. A media scholar specializing in effective communication in social media. Founder and host of the podcast Met@phor_Game. Researcher of socially engaged video games. Lecturer in Polish as a foreign language. Member of the Serious Games Society and the Polish Society for Film and Media Studies. Author of the books: Media Strategies in the Texts of the Latest Polish Drama (2010), The Informational and Operational Potential of Serious Online Games in the System of Social Communication (2016), The Metaphorics of Polish Political Browser Games: Contexts – Comparisons – Analyses (2020), Ubiquitous Video Games, or 113 Tweets on the Conquest of the Global Mediasphere and Winning the Hearts of Players (2025). Co-editor of monographs devoted to the professionalization and instrumentalization of social media.

Dr Adam Błaszczok

adam.blaszczok@uwm.edu.pl
https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9874-6983

Affiliation:

Institute of Journalism and Social Communication, University of Warmia and Mazury in Olsztyn Poland