News Paper Reports of Bank Robberies and the Copycat Phenomenon

In response to concern about newspaper coverage of bank robberies in Australia, this study examines whether newspaper publicity resulting from successful bank robberies leads to copycat increases of bank and other robberies during the following week. It makes use of police records of robberies in New South Wales and newspaper stories for 1987 to 1989 from the two tabloids published daily in Sydney. No evidence of any copycat effect was found. Moreover, there was little evidence that the newspapers concerned were paying undue attention to bank robbery.