Mass Communication and Society 1999 Abstracts
Mass Communication and Society Division
Drudging Up the News: The Drudge Report and Its Use of Sources • Scott Abel, Missouri • The media are undergoing a re-evaluation of their standards and practices in the wake of the Clinton scandal. One concern of traditional journalists is the impact of Internet sites, such as The Drudge Report, on their profession. Many point to Drudge as a major player in the erosion of media standards of not using anonymous sources. This study examines the types of stories posted on Drudge’s site and the sources used early in the scandal. It shows Drudge’s reliance on unnamed sources in stories he designated as exclusives.
Online Love: Have Chatrooms Changed How People Make Friends and Date People? • Raymond N. Ankney, North Carolina-Chapel Hill • Fifteen people who use online chatrooms to make friends and to date people were interviewed about their social interactions. Some of the major themes include the following: 1. the limitations of chatrooms-not being able to see facial expressions or to hear voice tones-leads to misunderstandings; 2. some people become so addicted to being in chatrooms that it has negative effects on their personal lives; 3. some women are victimized by men online.
Exploring ‘Drench’ Effects of Dramatic Media: A Test of Volcanic Disaster Portrayals • C. Mo Bahk and Kurt Neuwirth, Cincinnati • Drawing upon the notion of drench hypothesis proposed by Greenberg (1988), this study explores the role of viewing involvement, perceived realism, and role attractiveness as factors generating drench effects of dramatic media. One hundred fifty-eight undergraduate students were randomly assigned to one of four conditions. Participants in the experimental conditions were exposed to one of the four video clips: 1) the movie Volcano-a portrayal of a volcanic disaster taking place in the city of Los Angeles, 2) the documentary National Geographic Volcano, 3) an instructional video on gardening, and 4) the comedy Mr. Bean.
Gender Stereotyping and Intended Audience Age: An Analysis of Children’s Educational Informational TV Programming • Mark R. Barner, Niagara University • This study examined sex-role stereotyping within FCC-mandated children’s educational programming. A content analysis compared stereotyping across program age ranges and revealed that programs intended for young children present a more traditional view of sex roles than programs intended for teens. Male characters in old programs were stereotyped to a lesser extent than their young program counterparts. These results suggest that children are being exposed to consistently gender stereotyped television role models at precisely the age when they are forming their own sex role identities.
Differential Employment Rates in the Journalism and Mass Communication Labor Force Based on Gender, Race and Ethnicity: Exploring the Impact of Affirmative Action • Lee Becker, Edmund Lauf and Wilson Lowrey, Georgia • This paper examines whether gender and race and ethnicity are associated with employment in the journalism and mass communication labor market and-if discrepancies in employment exist-what explanations might be offered for them. The data show strong evidence that race and ethnicity are associated with lower level of employment among journalism and mass communication graduates. These discrepancies in success in the job market are not explainable by factors normally associated with hiring, such type of training, type of institution offering the training, or qualifications such as internships experience and level of performance in the classroom.
Whither Now?: Six Years of Internet Research in Mass Communications, 1993-1998 • Joel M. Benson and Thomas Gould, Kansas state University • This paper proposes to outline six years of research in mass communications targeting the Internet. This is an initial study focusing narrowly on the Internet, and as such, will be expanded in the future to include such subsets as the online journalism, interactive advertising, etc. Initially, however, the focus is just on the Internet and World Wide Web and limited to the years 1993 to 1998, inclusive.
New Media, Old Values: What Online Journalists say is Important to Them • Ann M. Brill, Missouri • This study seeks to advance the knowledge and understanding of the roles and values of online journalists. Using Weaver and WIhoit’s analysis of the functions that journalists in other media have rated as very important, the study examines the similarities and differences between the online and traditional environments and the journalists working within them. Findings led to the creation of an additional function-”marketing”-that seems to be embraced by online journalists.
Florida’s Public Records Law Put to the Test: Gaining Access to Crime Statistics • Michele Bush, Florida • One of the greatest checks of government’s inefficiency or corruption is the public’s right to access government information. However, it is not sufficient to accept that because there are legal provisions granting the public access to information, the public is actually receiving that access. To fully evaluate the openness of government, the practical application of access laws must be tested. Only then can scholars know whether citizens have access to government information.
Mass Media, the New Environmental Paradigm, and Environmental Activism: A Change in Focus • Jessica Staples Butler and James Shanahan, Cornell University • This analysis examined the association between media use, adherence to the “new environmental paradigm,” and environmental activism. There was a strong negative relation between television viewing and environmental activism. This correlation retained statistical significance under simultaneous control for age, gender, education level, and political affiliation. Regression analysis shows that television is the second largest predictor of behavior, independent of other factors. There was no relation between television viewing and all three NEP factors.
The Logic of the Link: The Associative Paradigm in Communication Criticism • Dennis Cali, East Carolina University • The metaphor of hypertext or “link” shapes the way we think about and process contemporary informational forms, overtaking the Traditionalist paradigm for constructing and critically analyzing texts. This essay examines the features of the newly-emerging Associative paradigm accompanying hypertext vis-a-vis the Traditionalist paradigm underlying print documents. The implications to communication criticism (practice and pedagogy)-and thus to culture and society-are considered.
The Impacts of News Frames and Ad Types on Candidate Perception and Political Cynicism during the 1998 Taipei Mayoral Election in Taiwan • Chingching Chang, National Cheng-chi University • The aim of this study is twofold. First, examining how commonly strategy-framed stories were used in the newspaper coverage of the 1998 Taipei mayoral election and how prevalently negative political ads were employed in this election. Second, employing a field experiment to explore whether exposure to campaign news with different frames and campaign ads of different valence had an impact on political cynicism and candidate evaluations.
Foreign Policy, Ideological Exclusion and the Media: How the American Press Shifts its News Coverage of Gerry Adams • Kuang-Kuo Chang, Michigan State • The present study examines the interplay among foreign policy, ideological exclusion, the U.S. president and the American press. The research proposed and found support for the hypotheses that the U.S. press has shifted its news editorial policy toward Gerry Adams, the leader of Sinn Fein, across different presidencies. More specifically, the press was shown to be more favorable and accessible to Adams under the Clinton than the Reagan/Bush regime.
Interactivity and the ‘Cyber-Fan’: Audience Involvement Within the Electronic Fan Culture of the Internet • Vic Costello, Gardner-Webb University • Television viewing involvement and interpersonal communication activity were observed within the electronic fan culture of the Internet. A web-based survey was administered to a sample population (N=3,041) of cyber-fans-individuals who use the Internet to keep up with their favorite television program and to connect with other fans. Variables included favorite program affinity, parasocial interaction, post-viewing cognition, Internet affinity, interactivity, and interpersonal communication satisfaction. Six hypotheses received support from the data analysis.
The Portrayal of Race and Crime on Network News: An exploratory Study • Travis L. Dixon, Michigan • A content analysis of a random sample of network news programming was conducted in order to assess the portrayal of race and criminal behavior. It revealed that Whites are accorded prominent roles as perpetrators, victims and reporters on network news. Latinos are largely portrayed as victims while Blacks are more likely to appear in the role of perpetrator than victim or reporter. The implications of these findings are discussed in terms of the structural limitations of network news and an ethnic blame discourse. We argue for further investigation of race and crime on network television news.
Subservient Baby Sitters and their Symbiotic Relationships with the Press: The Congressional Press Secretaries’ Interactions with the Media and the Member of Congress • Edward J. Downes, Boston University • This paper examines the Congressional press secretaries’ relationships with the Members for whom they work and the media they serve. It is based on three data sets: a focus group, interviews, and a survey. Its findings suggest the press secretaries enjoy their work; serve the Member with deference; and have a relationship with the media based on guarded honesty. Alphas examining these relationships were developed and are available for future research.
Public Life, Community Integration and the Mass Media: The Empirical Turn • Lewis A. Friedland, Naewon Kang, Kathryn B. Campbell and Bob Pondillo, Wisconsin • In this paper, we first have attempted to lay out a revised theoretical framework for the study of the public sphere, reconceptionalizing it as a series of network relationships. Second, we have reported on a series of small studies designed to show how this reconceptualization might look within the framework of community integration. Our interviews found that all of the groups shared a distrust of the media. Our framing analysis has confirmed that these publics with some variations were reflected in the coverage of both newspapers.
When Bad Things Happen to Bad People: Motivations for Viewing TV Talk Shows • Cynthia M. Frisby, Missouri • Why are millions of people attracted to, what some term, “trash TV” talk shows? Self-enhancement, or feeling better about oneself and one’s life, may be one of the primary reasons people watch what some consider to be “trashy” television talk programs. An experimental factorial design was used to evaluate predictions made from social comparison theory. Data obtained suggest that high self-esteem people felt better and experienced greater benefits after exposure to inferior, incompetent guests.
Journalists And Their Computers: An Inseparable Link For The Future? • Bruce Garrison, Miami • This study analyzes the role of computers in newsgathering. Drawing on daily newspaper data collected in annual national censuses between 1994 and 1998, the study reviews use of computers in newsrooms, needs for new computer skills, the most-sought computer tools, leading subjects for news stories and projects, and journalists’ perceptions of advantages and disadvantages that accompany computer use. The study found computer use has steadily grown during 1994-98 and that newsrooms seem to be making a serious commitment to use of computers in gathering news.
The Body Electric: Thin-Ideal Media and Eating Disorders in Adolescents • Kristen Harrison, Michigan • An instrumental replication of survey research demonstrating the link between thin-ideal media exposure and eating disorders was conducted with a sample of 366 6th, 9th, and 12th graders. Measures included interest in thin-ideal media content, exposure to thin-ideal television and magazines, and eating disorder symptomatology. Thin-ideal media exposure positively predicted eating disorder variables most frequently for older adolescents and girls. Relationships remained robust even when selective exposure based on interest in thinness-oriented media content was controlled.
Balancing Acts: Work/Family Issues on Prime-Time TV • Katharine E. Heintz-Knowles, Kristen Engstrand, Hilary Karasz and Meredith LiVollmer, Washington • A content analysis of two weeks of network-originated prime time television entertainment discovered that most TV adults were shown in either work or domestic situations, with little overlap between these two worlds. TV adults were infrequently shown attending to child care or elder care obligations, which were rarely presented as problematic The authors conclude that television is out of sync with real families who find balancing family and work a major issue in their lives.
Agenda Setting And The Y2K Bug: Paths Of Influence On Behaviors And Issue Salience • Emily Erickson Hoff, Laura Arpan Ralstin, Francesca Dillman, Alison Bryant, Alabama • This study seeks to build upon the agenda-setting models developed by Wanta (Wanta & Hu, 1994; Wanta, 1997) to examine individual-level variables by adding a new element to the process. Taking advantage of a unique issue that is currently growing on the media and public agenda – the Y2K bug – we examined three dependent variables: level of concern/involvement, planned behavior regarding Y2K computer compliance, and planned behavior regarding general Y2K preparation.
Absence of Dissent: A Linkage Analysts of Voting Records in National News Council Decisions, 1973-84 • L. Paul Husselbee, Lamar University • Previous research on the National News Council has suggested the need to analyze individual and collective voting behaviors of News Council members. This study addresses that need by using linkage analysis, a method similar to factor analysis, to examine News Council members’ voting records. The analysis seeks to identify the presence or absence of factions within the News Council, which was divided unevenly between “public” and “media” members.
Television News Impact on Images and Attitudes towards the United States • Yasuhiro Inoue, Michigan State University • With reference to cultivation theory, the present study hypothesized that an image of a dangerous America would be partly attributed to Japanese television news programs that portray the U.S. in violent terms. The data suggest that heavy news watchers held less positive attitudes towards the U.S. than light watchers did. On the other hand, heavy news watchers estimated lower murder rates in the U.S. compared to murders in Japan. This finding indicates a reverse cultivation.
Migrant workers: Myth or Reality? A Case Study of new Narratives in Thailand’s English-Language Newspapers • Suda Ishida, Iowa • The paper examines news coverage of migrant workers from Indochina and Burma that appeared in two Thailand’s English-language dailies-The Nation and the Bangkok Post-during the 1997 Asian economic crisis. The Thai media’s use of news patterns reflects bias against migrant workers. The narrative patterns, the author argues, can be traced to the pro-nationalist history of Thailand written in the 1930s, and may be seen as perpetuating stereotypes about Thailand’s neighboring countries.
Using is Believing: The Influence of Reliance on the Credibility of Online Political Information • Thomas Johnson, Southern Illinois University and Barbara K. Kaye, Valdosta State University • This study surveyed politically interested Web users online to investigate the degree to which reliance on traditional and online sources predicts credibility of online newspapers, television news, newsmagazines, candidate literature and political issue-oriented sites after controlling for demographic and political factors. Reliance on online and traditional media was the strongest predictor of credibility of online sources. Reliance on traditional media tended to be a stronger predictor of credibility of its online counterpart than reliance on the Web in general.
Public Trust or Mistrust?: Perceptions of Media Credibility in the Information Age • Spiro Kiousis, Texas • This paper explores perceptions of news credibility for television, newspapers, and online news. A survey was administered to a randomly selected sample of residents in Austin, Texas, to assess people’s attitudes toward these three media channels. Contingent factors that might influence news credibility perceptions, such as media use and interpersonal discussion of news, were also incorporated into the analysis. Findings suggest that people are generally skeptical of news emanating from all three media channels but do rate newspapers with the highest credibility, followed by online news, and television news respectively.
Evidence of Gender Disparity in Children’s Computer Use and Activities • M.J. Land, Georgia College & State University • This multi-method study examines the differences in male and female computer use in the home of children ages 9-14. Long interviews, observations, and surveys with children show males spend more time on the computer, but not on-line than females. Males and females engage in different computer activities. They play computer games about the same amount of time, but females spend more time on the computer to do word processing and desk-top publishing activities.
MPAA Film Ratings: Are they a Disservice to Parents? • Ron Leone, Syracuse University • The MPAA claims that film ratings are a guide for parents when deciding what movies their children can see. One criticism of the MPAA is that-despite evidence suggesting that violent content is more harmful to children than sexual content-they “target” sex. Here, it is hypothesized that parents of minors will have different opinions about children and sexual or violent film content than other adults. A telephone survey of 368 adults in Onandaga County, NY was conducted and used to test the hypotheses, which received limited support.
Setting the Media Agenda: The President and His Honeymoon with the Media • Yulian Li, Minnesota • This study addresses the question of who sets the media agenda by correlating the issue agenda of President Clinton with that of the major newspapers and television networks. It finds that the president has strong influence on the media agenda during his first year in office, i.e., the honeymoon period. It also indicates that there is a two-way flow of influence between the president and the media on certain issues.
The Big Scare: A Longitudinal Analysis of Network TV Crime Reporting, Public Perceptions of Crime and FBI Crime Statistics • Dennis T. Lowry and Josephine T.C. Nio, Southern Illinois University • Public perceptions of crime as the most important problem facing the country jumped tenfold, from 5% in March of 1992 to an unprecedented 52% in August of 1994. This paper analyzed the effects of three network television news predictor variables and two FBI predictor variables to determine what caused this “big scare.” Based upon data from 1982 through 1997, results indicated that the 1994 “big scare” was more a network TV news scare than a scare based upon the real world of crime.
Academic Letters of Recommendation: Perceived Ethical Implications and Harmful Effects of Exaggeration • David L. Martinson, Florida International University and Michael Ryan, Houston • This national survey of 150 assistant professors, associate professors and professors in schools and departments of journalism and mass communication focuses on the extent to which faculty members exaggerate recommendation letters, perceive that letters written by their colleagues are exaggerated, and believe that exaggeration is harmful and/or unethical. Results suggest that letters written in behalf of students and faculty colleagues are exaggerated, but perhaps not as much as some might imagine.
Pacing in Children’s Television Programming • James F. McCollum Jr., Lipscomb University and Jennings Bryant, Alabama • Following a content analysis, 85 children’s television programs were assigned a pacing index derived from the following criteria: (a) frequency of camera cuts, (b) frequency of related scene changes, (c) frequency of unrelated scene changes, (d) frequency of auditory changes, (e) percentage of active motion, (f) percentage of active talking, and (g) percentage of active music. ANOVA procedures reveal significant differences in networks’ pacing overall and in the individual criteria.
Do You Admit Or Deny? An Experiment In Public Perceptions Of Politicians Accused Of Scandal • Patrick Meirick and Zixue Tai, Minnesota • Scandal news has assumed an increasingly significant role in politics in recent years. Adapting the expectancy-value model to a new arena, this study examines the effects of three factors on politician evaluation: level of evidence, severity of the scandal, and the politician’s response. All three have a significant effect. It appears that denial is the best policy at least in the short run. A predicted interaction between evidence and response was not significant.
How Close is Our Relationship with Television Characters?: The Semantic Difference among Self, Best Friend, Closest Family Member, Closest Acquaintance, and Favorite Television Character • Woong Ki Park, Temple University • This study was an attempt to examine the effect of mass mediated communication on the processes of interpersonal relationship by using Horton and Wohl’s (1956) parasocial phenomenon concept. A series of bipolar semantic differential scales were administered to undergraduate and graduate students (n = 217) who were regular television viewers to see the semantic differences in relationship among viewers themselves and a number of items. The scales measured distance in semantic space among the viewers, best friend, closest family member, closest acquaintance, and favorite television character.
Deliberation And Democracy: Toward An Understanding Of Deliberative Processes • Dietram A. Scheufele and Lewis Friedland, Wisconsin and Patricia Moy, Washington • This paper addresses the discrepancy between normative ideals and empirical realities of a deliberative democracy. Based on a review of previous attempts to increase participation in deliberative processes, we develop a conceptual overview of deliberative democracy, defining the construct with respect to both inputs and outcomes. which factors make citizens more or less likely to participate in deliberative processes? How do actual outcomes of deliberation measure up to normative ideals put forth by deliberative theorists?
Does Tabloidization Really Make Newspapers Successful? A Summary of an Explorative Study • Klaus Schoenbach, Amsterdam • Concerned observers all over the world agree: Newspapers do not only follow a trend toward less serious, more emotional reporting and toward colorful, fuzzy layouts with many visual elements. The audience presumably also appreciates these developments. If tabloidization really sells was one of the questions of a tracking study of 350 local daily (workday) newspapers in Germany. Their efforts to attract readers in the first half of the 1 990s were systematically evaluated.
Autonomy in Journalism: How It Is Related to Attitudes and Behavior of Media Professionals • Armin Scholl and Siegfried Weischenberg, Muenster • Autonomy is a main characteristic of professions. Social system theory suggests observing journalism in terms of self-referentiality and external referentiality. In our study “Journalism in Germany”, we could identify a particular self-referential group of journalists1 which differed from the rest of the sample regarding role perception, unusual reporting practices and assessment of press-releases. Data provided further evidence for a more. complex and adequate perspective on journalists’ attitudes and behavior.
Expanding the ‘Virtuous Circle’ of Social Capital: Civic Engagement, Contentment, and Interpersonal Trust • Dhavan V. Shah, R. Lance Holbert and Nojin Kwak, Wisconsin • This research clarifies the mechanisms underlying the formation and sustenance of social capital on the individual level. First, it expands the conception of social capital by including life contentment in the “virtuous circle” of civic engagement and interpersonal trust. Second, it tests a structural model composed of these three endogenous variables. This analysis permits an examination of (a) the strength and direction of the causal relationships comprising the “virtuous circle’ of engagement, contentment, and trust; (b) the demographic, situational/contextual, personality, and attitudinal factors that are exogenous to these latent variables.
Changes in Female Roles in Taiwanese Women’s Magazines, 1971-1992 • Ping Shaw, National Sun Yat-sen University • A thematic content analysis performed on a sample of articles published in Woman and New Woman magazines over the period of 1971 to 1992 revealed a decline in the number having themes of women as wives, mothers, and homemakers and an increase in articles with political, social and economic themes. Traditional sex role models, however, still dominate the pages of most women’s magazines.
A Reassessment of the Relationship Between Public Affairs Media Use and Political Orientations • Kim A. Smith, Iowa State University • This study examined the influence of public affairs media on changes in diffuse and specific political orientations between the 1990 and 1992 general election campaigns, utilizing a two-wave panel of respondents. The results indicated that use of public affairs media was related to changes in the specific orientations of campaign interest, political discussion and attention to the campaign in the media in 1992. While public affairs media use did not influence the diffuse orientations of perceived political efficacy and political trust in 1992, it did predict changes in 1992 strength of partisanship.
Media Use and Perceptions of Welfare • Mira Sotirovic, Illinois • This paper examines public perceptions of the extent of governmental spending on welfare and the characteristics of a typical welfare recipient. It analyzes how these perceptions reflect differences in individuals’ media use, and how they affect individual’s support for welfare programs. The evidence shows that media use has an important influence on perceptions of welfare after accounting for demographic, ideological and interpersonal-contextual influences. Watching television entertainment, and cable news channel viewing work in the direction of introducing typical biases in welfare perceptions: overestimation of the percent of federal budget spent on welfare, perception of welfare recipients as being non-white, and of younger age.
Teenage Sexuality and Media Practice: Negotiating the Influences of Media, family, Friends and School • Jeanne Rogge Steele, Ohio University • How do mass media images and messages about love, sex and relationships interact with what teens learn about sexuality at home, in school and from their friends? Data generated in this multi-method, qualitative study suggest that Identity, tempered by ethnicity, gender, class status and developmental phase, plays an important role in media practice. The Adolescents’ Media Practice Model (Steele & Brown, 1995) is refined to include Resistance as a form of Application.
Social Structure, Media System and Audiences in China: Testing the Uses and Dependency Model • Tao Sun and Tsan-Kuo Chang, Minnesota: Yu Guoming, Chinese People’s University • Much has been written about the structure and processes of China’s mass media changes before and after the late Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping initiated the economic reform and open-door policies in the late 1970s. Many of them focused on the commercialization, de-politicalization and internationalization of Chinese media as a result of the market economy and external openness. Little known, however, is how the audiences get caught up in the interplay between the fast changing social structure and the evolving media system in China.
Screen Sex, ‘Zine Sex and Teen Sex: Do Television and Magazines Cultivate Adolescent Females’ Sexual Attitudes? • Michael J. Sutton and Jane D. Brown, North Carolina-Chapel Hill, Karen M. Wilson and Jonathan D. Klein, Rochester • A cultivation analysis of a national sample of 1,921 high school girls shows that magazines may mitigate attitudes toward the frequently risky sexual behaviors shown on television. Girls who said they learned about birth control, contraception, and preventing pregnancy from both magazines and television were more likely than girls who learned about contraception from television but not magazines to say they would be upset if they became pregnant at their current age.
Electronic Politics: The Internet As A Tool Of Political Communication • Mustafa Taha, Ohio University • This paper examines the uses of the Internet as a tool of political communication in U.S. It explores how the Internet is leveling the field for political activists who do not have access to traditional media outlets. The paper shows how the Internet’s interactivity enhances political discourse, and how the Web Wide Web can be used during political campaigns. It demonstrates how politicians relied on the Internet to raise funds and get the vote out, during the 1998 mid-term senatorial and gubernatorial elections.
Media Consumption and Social Capital Patterns in Urban African Americans and Whites • Esther Thorson and Ken Fleming, Missouri and Michael Antecol, Stanford • The survey research reported here was examined for links between exposure and attention to newspapers, local television news, and entertainment television and patterns of social capital exhibited by African Americans and Whites in a large Midwest city. The news media of the city included a daily newspaper that has been committed to public journalistic approaches for approximately three years. Part of the public journalism effort has involved increased efforts to communicate meaningfully with the large African American population in the city.
Is the Web Sexist? A Content Analysis of Children’s Web Sites • Linda Ver Steeg, Robert LaRose and Lynn Rampoldi-Hnilo, Michigan State University • A sample of twenty children’s Web sites (n=200 pages) was analyzed at the site, page, and character levels for sex role stereotypes. The characters (n=164) were 51% male. Results showed discrepancies between male and female characters for age, occupational portrayals, dress, and physical attractiveness. However, no gender differences were found for the types of activities characters engaged in (e.g., passive, active) or for the settings in which they were portrayed (e.g., home, outdoors).
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