Researchers from Lund and Halmstad are behind the study, which examines how gender and foreign backgrounds affect journalists' vulnerability.
Over 3,000 members of the Swedish Journalists' Association have been asked whether they have been subjected to the offenses of insult, slander, harassment, threats, unlawful breaches of privacy, sexual harassment or incitement against ethnic groups in connection with their professional role during the past three years.
70 percent state that they have been subjected to insult, 40 percent to slander and 23 percent to harassment and illegal threats.
The researchers have also looked in particular at the vulnerability among people with a foreign background.
Of those who participated, 16 percent state that they have a foreign background and the results of the study show that they to a greater extent than other journalists feel that they have been exposed to all types of crime except insult.
- We see that they to a large extent receive threats and hatred of a racist nature, says Oscar Björkenfeldt, doctoral student at Lund University who is one of the researchers behind the study.
"Extremely alarming"
- We also see that the health of this group is more negatively affected by the vulnerability, but also that they to a greater extent refrain from reporting on a topic due to threats and hatred and that is of course extremely worrying, says Oscar Björkenfeldt.
39 percent of journalists state that for the past three years they have refrained from reporting on a topic to avoid threats or hatred.
For the group with a foreign background, the figure is 45 percent.
- When so many journalists refrain from reporting, it will affect how the public conversation is conducted, says Oscar Björkenfeldt.
He does not think journalists will stop covering topics that often lead to threats and hatred, such as migration and gender equality.
- But how to discuss them may gradually be moved if it continues as it looks today, says Oscar Björkenfeldt.