Though Muslims and Islam are generally depicted negatively in the media, one concept whose misrepresentation continues to incite negative opinions and heated debate is jihad (often understood in Islam as a struggle in the path of Allah, meaning to promote “good” and prevent “evil”). While many scholars have examined how Islam and Muslims are portrayed in the media, few explicitly focus on the representation of jihad and its sociological media analysis, despite its widespread use. Using the Orientalism theory, this thesis examines the complex relationship between the news media and social attitudes by investigating the jihad discourse in Australian newspapers. One part of the thesis investigates the results of a survey that analyses how media representation of jihad directly shapes non-Muslim Australians’ understanding of this discourse and indirectly influences broader social attitudes. This dataset contains an Excel spreadsheet that records the data collected from a survey that was carried out in Sydney in 2020 - 2021. The survey was administered towards non-Muslim Australian citizens who were 18 years and above. The survey asked participants questions related to their understanding of jihad. This dataset cannot be openly published. To discuss this research, please contact Anum Sikandar, 19584818@student.westernsydney.edu.au [0000-0002-0046-9744].