Recognizing Is Not Reversing: A Controlled Inversion Test of Fact-Preserving News Framing
Abstract: Large language models (LLMs) are increasingly used to analyze and rewrite news, yet current framing studies mainly evaluate generation, detection, or whether rewritten text appears more neutral. They do not directly show whether a model can undo a known framing transformation while keeping the facts fixed. We introduce a controlled inversion test over three established textual realizations of framing: evaluative lexis, agency realization, and information salience. Across 60 news articles and three intervention strengths, this yields 540 paired variants with preserved atomic facts and recorded edits. Across Qwen, DeepSeek, and Kimi, factual preservation remains near 0.84, whereas intervention reversal is 0.044--0.068. Even when both framing type and direction are recognized correctly, pooled reversal reaches 0.071. These results reveal a clear separation between factual fidelity, framing recognition, and framing inversion: recognizing how an article is framed does not imply that the framing can be undone.