Minorities and Communication 2000 Abstracts

Minorities and Communication Division

Faculty Competition
Diversity in Local Television News: A Clogged Pipeline? • Terry Anzur, Sheila Murphy and Mieke Schechter, Southern California • The article presents a survey of television news directors in markets ranked between 100th and 150th nationally in terms of size, where aspiring TV news anchors and reporters get their first jobs. Entry-level hiring is done primarily by white males and reflects their perceptions of the local audience, the perceived difficulty of finding qualified applicants and the low priority placed on diversity. Women and minorities are under-represented among actual hires, contributing to an industry-wide shortage of diverse on-air talent.

Crime and Ethnic Group Coverage: Media Exposure and Audience Perceptions • Christopher E. Beaudoin and Esther Thorson, Missouri-Columbia • This study examines connections among media exposure and audience perceptions of ethnicity and crime coverage — in light of the continuing decline of newspaper readership. Relying on a telephone survey, it demonstrated that different ethnic groups view coverage in different ways and that newspaper readership was positively correlated with perceptions of coverage. The opposite was true for local broadcast news. Via structural equation modeling, the study suggests that perception determines media use • and, thus, that low credibility may undermine readership.

Copycats, Conspirators and Bigots: Themes in Southern, Northern and Western Newspaper Editorial Portrayals of the Black Church-burning Crisis • Sharon Bramlett-Solomon, Arizona State • Between January 1, 1995 and December 1997 at least 142 black churches were set on fire through arson, bombings or attempted bombings. Examination of all church burnings’ editorials appearing in the Lexis Nexis database and Editorials on File over this two-year period, yielded 109 editorials for content analysis. Findings in this preliminary study call into question the assumption of some media critics and scholars who suggest that regional differences exist in southern and northern newspaper portrayals of racial conflicts.

Media Correlates of a Protest in a Minority Community: Southern California’s Vietnamese Americans and the Hi-Tek Video Store Incident • Jeffrey Brody, Tony Rimmer & Edgar P. Trotter • California State-Fullerton — This paper explores correlates of participation in a protest in an immigrant community. Participation was assumed to be inversely associated with acculturation, political tolerance, and perceptions of English and Vietnamese-language media. Bivariate analyses of a 41 8-respondent survey showed no discrimination between protesters and nonprotesters on demographic variables, some discrimination on acculturation measures (on two attitudinal but not on three language proficiency indices), and significant discrimination on measures of media use and assessment of coverage of the incident.

Constructing Blackness: Media Coverage of African American Support for President Clinton • Dwight E. Brooks, Georgia and James A. Rada, Rowan • African American support for President Clinton. Nearly 40 broadcast, newspaper and magazine stories produce explanations that were placed into five discursive themes: morality, political pragmatism, distrust of the criminal justice system, forgiveness/redemption, and Clinton’s rapport with African Americans. The media not only contribute to the social construction of Blackness in intriguing ways, but its failure to explain White support (or lack of) for the President reinforces the invisibility of Whiteness as the norm.

Black in White: A Historical Inquiry into the Afro-Caribbean Press in the U.K. • James P. Danky, State Historical Society of Wisconsin and David Henning, Wisconsin • This paper, the initial part of a larger project on Afro-Caribbean and Diasporic journalism, asks the question “what do academic journalism histories say about the press by and for British blacks?” This paper begins with an overview of British journalism historiography from the nineteenth century to the present, looks at publications by and for British blacks, and treatments of that journalism by the academy. This paper is also a contribution to black British historical studies.

A Myth Analysis of Race and Beauty in Teen Magazines • Meenakshi Gigi Durham, Texas at Austin • This paper examines how race and beauty are interpreted by popular media targeted to teenage girls, in the context of the contemporary politics of diversity. This research employed myth analysis (Barthes, 1972) to uncover the ideological themes underpinning the discourses of racialized beauty in four top-circulating teen magazines. The analysis revealed a construction of beauty in which race was used as a device to orient girls toward consumerism by glossing over its political, historical, and cultural moorings and reinscribing categorical racial boundaries.

Black Like Me: How Idealized Images of Caucasian Women Affect Body Esteem and Mood States of African-American Females • Cynthia M. Frisby, Missouri • Using the theory of social comparison, the present research explores how exposure to idealized images of physically attractive Caucasian women affects and changes the self reported esteem levels of African-American women. Though research reveals that the number of portrayals of African-Americans in ads is growing, little if any research has explored how images and advertisements influence behaviors and attitudes toward advertising images and messages. A sample of African-American females was surveyed on body esteem and other self-perception variables.

What A Difference A Channel Makes: Commercial Images In General Market V. Spanish Language Television • Jami Armstrong Fullerton, Oklahoma State and Alice Kendrick, Southern Methodist • Analysis of prime time commercials on NBC and Univision revealed the occurrence of significantly fewer commercials on Univision as well as significantly more inventory devoted to public service announcements. Commercials on the networks were also found to focus on different products and services. Roles of primary characters on NBC revealed a strong professional male presence on the general market network, contrasted with the prevalence of female characters on Univision.

Bridges Across the Digital Divide: An Exploratory Study of AHANA and Women’s Websites on the Internet • Dennis W. Jeffers, Central Michigan • This paper reports the results of an exploratory study which examined content of websites targeted at African-Americans, Hispanics, Asians, Native Americans and women (AHANA/W), as well as the content of OneNetNow.com: a recently launched website designed to bridge the digital divide. The study focused on a large number of “demographic” and “content” variables previously used to document the digital divide. The results suggest that there is a great deal of similarity between websites not specifically designed to bridge the digital divide (existing AHANA/W sites) and OneNetNow.com.

Race and the Praxis of Crime Reporting: A Narrative Paradigm for Portrayals of Deviance • Craig Maier and Maggie Patterson, Duquesne • Social science studies present conflicting evidence of the effects of crime and race news coverage on audience and lead to a seemingly intractable debate. This essay suggests that narrative analysis may be a more useful tool. Using the content of an original study done in City X a mid-sized, mid-Atlantic city, and previously published social scientific research as a point of departure, this paper explores how narrative theory reconfigures race, crime news, and public opinion.

Do Skin Tones Matter When Judging the Guilt of Accused African Americans Pictured in News Crime Stories? • Dwyane Proctor, University of Connecticut Health Center and L.B. Snyder, Connecticut • Pundits’ claim that darkening complexions of African Americans accused of crimes in news photographs influence readers to prejudge the accused as guilty. Potential jurors (N = 421) read one of three news articles about a man arrested for murder. Two articles contained a photo of the accused; he was shown as African American with light or dark colored skin. The third article contained no photo or ethnic description of the accused.

What a Difference a Year Makes: A Content Analysis Before and After the Start of a Latino Initiative • Shelly Rodgers and Esther Thorson, Missouri-Columbia • In an attempt to connect with and maintain readers, the Los Angeles Times launched a Latino initiative in the fall of 1998. The goal of the initiative was to seek out more Latino sources across a wider variety of topics. Although the Latino initiative is still on-going at the Times we wanted to see whether changes in the numbers and representations of Latinos were noticeable after one year of the initiative’s start date. Our findings suggest improvements in the representation of Latinos.

The University of North Dakota’s Fighting Sioux Logo • Raul Tovares, North Dakota • Taking a Gramscian perspective, this paper interrogates an official document addressing the University of North Dakota’s Fighting Sioux logo. Prior to the late 1960s the dominance of the UND campus by white students, faculty, and administrators created a climate in which the appropriation of Native American images and symbols for fun and sport went largely unquestioned. The debates that have developed around the Fighting Sioux logo reflect the struggles of different groups to define the parameters of acceptable and unacceptable forms of communication.

Student Competition
Media Messages and the Thin Standard: Are African-American Women Receiving the Same Messages? • Laura I. Collier, Houston • A content analysis of three African-American and three Caucasian women’s magazines (72 issues) for the year 1997 was conducted to ascertain if African-American women receive the same thinness-depicting messages characteristically observed in the Caucasian media. In addition, body measurements of models found in Ebony and Ladies’ Home Journal from 1945-1998 were conducted. Results revealed African-American magazines place less emphasis on content dealing with body/shape/size. However, body measurements of African-American models follow similar thinness trends to Caucasian models.

Television Network Diversity Deals and Citizen Group Action in 21st Century Broadcasting Policy • George Daniels, Georgia • This paper provides an analysis of recent efforts by the NAACP and other ethnic groups to negotiate diversity agreements for employment and programming at the four major broadcast networks. The calls for diversity issued in 1999 are compared to the work of citizen action groups that influenced broadcasting policy in the 1960s and 1970s. With varying mechanisms for network accountability and monitoring of diversity, the agreements amounted mostly to a victory in the “court of public opinion.”

Building Identification with Hispanic Voters via the Web • Maria Len-Rios, Missouri-Columbia • This is the one of the first studies to examine presidential campaign messages targeting Hispanic voters during the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary. A case study, employing textual analysis guided by using Kenneth Burke’s concept of identification, is used to determine how Bush and Gore identified with Hispanic voters through (l) common experiences/association, (2) antithesis, and (3) subtlety or cunning. Results reveal that Bush invested more in his “En Espanol” Web site.

Pointing Fingers: Victim Blaming and News Coverage of African-Americans, Health and Public Policy in Two Major Metropolitan Newspapers • Nicole Mikel-Brumfield, Florida • The presence of victim blaming of African-Americans and their health issues, as it relates to public policy, was examined through the content analysis of two newspapers, the Cleveland Plain Dealer and the New Orleans Times Picayune, from November 1997 to November 1998. Overall, the Times Picayune published more victim blaming articles than the Plain Dealer. Also, male reporters did more victim blaming as was more blatant than their female counterparts.

Justifying the FCC’s Minority Preference Policies • Seung Kwan Ryu, Southern Illinois-Carbondale • This study investigates how courts have used empirical evidence in justifying the standard review they applied as their rationale in FCC’s minority preference and equal protection policies. The study suggests that courts should adopt not only evidence of historical and societal discrimination but also empirical evidence as their rationale, since in previous studies empirical evidence has already shown a positive correlation between minority ownership and program diversity in broadcasting.

Gender Stereotypes and Race in Music Videos: Cultivating Unreality • Helena K. Sarkio, Minnesota • Cultivation research examines the extent to which television shapes its audience’s perception of reality. The objective of this study was to contribute to the understanding of how exposure to the total pattern of music videos can cultivate their viewers’ conceptions of Caucasian and African-American women and men. Through a content analysis of music videos on BET, MTV and VH1, significant differences between the four groups were uncovered.

<< 2000 Abstracts

Media Management and Economics 2000 Abstracts

Media Management and Economics Division

The Rise of Corporate Journalism: Providing the Basis for a Hostile Takeover and the Split of the Scripps Newspaper Empire • Edward E. Adams, Brigham Young • E.W. Scripps was among the early adopters of establishing corporate ownership for newspapers. It helped him to develop a chain, and provide incentives to editors and business managers who could own stock in the individual newspapers. The corporate structure also helped create the first corporate split in a newspaper company. This paper examines the corporate structure created by Scripps and the events that led up to the split. It also reviews how a separation was possible and the subsequent consolidation of the remaining Scripps papers.

Syndicated Service Dependence and a Lack of Commitment to Localism: Scripps Newspapers and Market Subordination • Edward E. Adams, Brigham Young • With the exception of only two markets • Cincinnati and Cleveland • all of the Scripps papers maintained a subordinated position. This paper suggests that Scripps papers held a subordinate market position due to heavy dependence on syndicated services and smaller amount of local copy when compared to competitors. Scripps papers maintained skeleton staffs and the newspaper content was heavily dependent on articles from other papers through the UP and NEA services.

The Television Joint Venture and News Content Diversity • Todd Chambers, Texas Tech; Dennis Harp; Jimmie Reeves, Texas Tech; Jeff Klotzman; Opal Lertutai; Joanna Miller and Ann Befort • The recent ownership rules changes for the local television industry have created new management opportunities and problems related to the provision of news programming. Shared service agreements that allow one company to manage the news and/or sales departments of another local television station have raised questions about the diversity of local news programming. This content analysis sought to explore the link between ownership structure and the diversity of television news content within a local market.

Strategic Competition in the Multichannel Video Programming Market: An Intra-Industry Strategic Group Analysis • Sylvia M. Chan-Olmsted and Jack C. C. Li, Florida • This paper applied a multichannel strategic group competition theory to assess the strategic patterns of the multichannel video programmers and the relationship between group membership and performance. Seven strategic groups were identified by a cluster analysis, including broadcasters’ cable niche group and cable-casters’ broadcast tier. There appears to be a relationship between strategic group membership and financial performance. Contrary to general industry belief, neither size nor vertical integration has played an important role in elevating the programmers’ financial performance.

The PBS Brand versus Cable Brands: Assessing the Brand Equity of Public Television in a Multichannel Environment • Sylvia M. Chan-Olmsted, Florida and Yungwook Kim, Illinois State • This paper assesses the brand equity of public television in a multichannel media environment by examining the brand image of public television and PBS in comparison to comparable cable networks. The authors found that public television continues to enjoy a very positive brand image among its viewers. The popularity of cable networks such as A&E, Discovery, and Nickelodeon did not dilute the positive brand perception of public television, nor did it change significantly the perceived importance of public television and the audience’s viewing behavior.

Who Owns Cable Television? Media Ownership Concentration in Taiwan • Ping-Hung Chen, National Taiwan Normal University • This study examines ownership concentration in Taiwan’s cable television industry by using concentration ratios (CR4 and CR8) and found that Taiwan’s cable systems and channels were highly concentrated in the hands of few media conglomerates, meaning that the cable industry has become more oligopolistic. Communications researchers in Taiwan should pay more attention to media ownership concentration across various communications industries or conduct further studies on cross-industry concentration in the communications sector.

Weekly Newspaper Industry: A Baseline Study • David Coulson, Nevada-Reno and Stephen Lacy, Michigan State and Jonathan Wilson, Nevada-Reno • This is the first study to examine important elements of the weekly newspaper industry. It will serve as a baseline for analyzing long-term changes in the business. A stratified random sample of 1,027 weekly newspapers was used. The industry was found to exhibit a great deal of variation in type of ownership, type of circulation, geographic location and day of publication. These variations affect advertising rates, advertising cost per thousand and circulation.

The Relationship Between What Managers Do and How Newsroom Workers Respond in Times of Change • George Daniels, Georgia • A key concern of many newsroom managers is successfully implementing change. Based on a survey of workers at CNN Headline News, where six major changes occurred simultaneously in 1998, information about how change relates to long-term goals was, by far, the most valuable predictor of how newsroom workers might respond to change. There was no relationship between an employee’s perceived level of communication and how likely an employee is to quit in a time of change.

The Influence of Timing of Market Entry on Competition in Local Cellular Telephone Markets • Hugh S. Fullerton, Sam Houston State • The American cellular telephone industry from its inception until the early l990s furnished a classic example of duopoly market structure at the local level. Earlier studies showed that firms in some markets exhibited substantial competitive behavior, while in other markets, firms were comparatively noncompetitive. In an effort to determine the roots of competitive behavior, this paper examines the influence of the timing of entry of the second firm into each market.

The Cultural Transformation of U.S. Newspapers: A Comparison of Management and Rank-and-File Attitudes Toward a Conceptual Model of Organizational Development • Peter Gade, Oklahoma • This study refines previous models of organizational development and in an attempt to build a stronger theoretical framework for understanding the process of change in the newspaper industry. A purposive sample of 18 newspapers affiliated with the American Society of Newspaper Editors Change Committee was used to survey a census of top newsroom managers and a random sample of rank-and-file most experienced with industry-wide change initiatives. The results indicate that management and rank-and file view the change process very differently.

How Magazines Covered Media Companies’ Merger: A Case of the Evolution of Time Inc. • Jaemin Jung, Florida • ABSTRACT NOT AVAILABLE.

Predicting Digital Cable Adoption: Who Will Be Upgrading to Digital Cable, and How Soon? • Myung-Hyun Kang, Michigan State • Digital cable is a technological innovation in the area of cable telecommunications, featuring more channels, more convenience, and more interactivity. The present study investigates the factors that influence the adoption of digital cable in terms of demographics, media use, technology ownership, their innovative attitudes, and their satisfaction with their cable company. Results of this study indicate that the earlier adoption of digital cable is more likely among those who watch television heavily, are satisfied with current cable service, and see themselves as well as their cable operator as technically progressive.

Looking for the Right Partners in the Information Era: A Longitudinal Study of Acquisition Strategies by the Communications Industries • Jack C.C. Li, Florida • The present paper uses the new industrial classification system (NAICS) to examine the acquisition patterns of the communications industries (TV, radio, cable, and telephony) from 1980 through 1999. Attention is focused on diversification strategies of entering the information industry. It is found that the 1996 Telecommunications Act has significant impact on the M&A patterns. The industries’ diversification strategies are also found to be influenced by the characteristics and historical background of the existing industries.

Great Expectations: Revealing a Placebo Effect in Brand Equity Evaluations of Network News Reporting • Walter S. McDowell and Steven J. Dick, Southern Illinois-Carbondale • The purpose of this study was first to explore the theoretical common ground shared by the concepts of placebo effects and brand equity and then to introduce the notion of media brand placebo effects within the context of audience evaluations of television program content. A controlled experiment, focusing on the perceived credibility of a network news report, provided support for two out of three hypotheses derived from this proposed branding construct.

Using Audience Turnover to Reveal the “Double Jeopardy” Effect In Television Daypart Ratings Performance • Walter S. McDowell and Steven J. Dick, Southern Illinois-Carbondale • Scores of conventional consumer goods studies have revealed that successful brands exhibit disproportionately greater consumer loyalty in terms of repeat purchases than less successful brands do. This phenomenon places struggling brands in a kind of “double jeopardy” posture, where they attract not only fewer customers, but also fewer loyalists. Studies of prime time television audience behavior in the 1980s found a similar double jeopardy effect.

Thriving on Chaos: A Case Study of Newspaper Cultural Change • Richard Somerville, Missouri • Newspaper managers are finding that major economic, social and technological shifts have thrown into the air all the revered assumptions about people and management practices. But accepting a need to adapt is not enough. The process of change has proved difficult to achieve even at modest levels. Massive paradigm shifts also are shaking up the field of organizational studies, with some theorists looking to chaos theory as a model for the 21st century business.

News Hole Sizing Polices At Nondaily Newspapers • Ken Smith, Wyoming • This study examined the methods used by nondaily newspapers to determine the sizes of their news holes. The results indicate that a large majority of nondailies (77.8%) base their news holes on a percentage of their advertising inches. In most cases, the type of advertising used to determine the sizes of the news holes was ROP advertising. Most nondailies did not take preprint advertising into account in sizing their news holes.

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Media Ethics 2000 Abstracts

Media Ethics Division

Searching for the Journalist Phrenemos: An Exploratory Study of the Ethical Development of News Workers • Renita Coleman and Lee Wilkins, Missouri • More than 2,500 years ago Aristotle defined the ethical person as a phrenemos. More contemporary research has focused on moral development. Almost every type of profession that must grapple with ethical issues has been studied in the context of moral reasoning, except journalists. This research proposes to measure journalists’ moral development in order to compare them with other professionals, and to discover which variables are the most significant predictors of higher moral reasoning in journalists — that is, to model the journalist phrenemos.

Covering the Ethics of Death: An Exploration of Three Model Approaches • David A. Craig, Oklahoma • Through an in-depth textual analysis, this paper examines portrayal of the ethics of assisted suicide and euthanasia in three 1998 newspaper pieces that are exemplary in the depth of their of their treatment of ethics — and therefore, it is argued, ethically responsible in their coverage. Presentation of deontological and consequentialist issues and of ethical questions and themes is examined in these pieces, and implications for ethics coverage are discussed.

Of Joint Ventures, Sock Puppets and New Media Synergy: Ethical Codes and the Emergence of Institutional Conflicts of Interest • Charles N. Davis & Stephanie Craft, Missouri • The trend toward cross-ownership raises ethical concerns about entanglements created in the name of synergy. Ethics scholarship routinely defines conflict of interest as an individual act, which ignores the rise of the media conglomerate. This paper introduces the institutional conflict of interest. The paper outlines how media consolidation creates new conflicts of interest by outlining the term’s definitions in various professions and providing a revised definition that encompasses institutional conflicts of interest.

Ethics for Editors: What 11 Editing Textbooks Teach • Susan Keith, North Carolina • Newspaper copy editors have a vital, though often unheralded, role to play in the production of ethical journalism. As the last people to see newspaper stories before publication, they have the opportunity to raise questions that can save newspapers from unnecessarily harming readers or sources or hurting their own credibility. Copy editors can do this, however, only if they develop a good sense of how ethical principles apply to their jobs. One source for such information is the editing textbook.

Contractualist Morality in News Reporting: What Journalists Owe to Story Subjects, News Sources and The Public • Kathleen L. Mason, Syracuse • Tim Scanlon’s “What we owe to each other” is the most recent substantive addition to ethical theory, and his contractualist theory is the topic of heated philosophical debate. His central notion, that right and wrong “are judgments about what would be permitted by principles that could not reasonably be rejected,” is presented in application to situations faced in daily life. This paper examines how Scanlon’s theory might be used by journalists as they seek to balance their duty to the public against their duties to the subjects and sources.

Beyond Kant Lite: Journalists and the Categorical Imperative • Lee Anne Peck, Ohio • The misunderstanding of Kant’s ethical theory by journalists comes in many forms. According to John Merrill, journalists may thing that if they apply the Categorical Imperative (CI), they are nothing more than “moral robots.” The CI, however, does not tell a person what to do; thus, this paper explores what the CI really entails and what journalists can take from it.

Philosophy in the Trenches: How Newspaper Editors Approach Ethical Questions • Patrick Lee Plaisance, Syracuse • This study sought to identify the various strains of philosophical principles brought to bear on ethical dilemmas by working journalists. A nationwide survey of newspaper managing editors and news editors solicited actual ethical dilemmas and examined how respondents assessed statements that corresponded to various philosophical principles. The study suggested that journalists tend to favor specific philosophical approaches when they are confronted with certain types of ethical questions, affirming calls by some media ethicists for a “pluralistic” approach in newsrooms.

The Concept of Media Accountability Reconsidered • Patrick Lee Plaisance, Syracuse • The concept of media accountability is widely used but remains inadequately defined in the literature and often is restricted to a one-dimensional interpretation. This study explores perceptions of accountability as manifestations of claims to responsibility, based on philosophical conceptions of the two terms, and suggests media accountability to be more broadly understood as a dynamic of interaction between a given medium and the value sets of individuals or groups receiving messages. The shape-shifting nature of the concept contributes to the volatility of debate surrounding conflicting notions of press freedom and responsibility.

Electronic Discussion Groups: An Effective Journalistic Ethical Forum? • Thomas E. Ruggiero, Texas-El Paso • Mass communication literature suggests a perceived ineffectuality of past and current journalistic ethical forums, such as news councils, ombudsmen, ethical codes, academic analysis and journalism reviews, by American journalists. This study investigates the ramifications of the recent introduction of electronic discussion groups, such as “LISTSERVs” and “electronic mailing lists,” as a mode of journalistic ethical discussion. Results of an e-mail questionnaire to 139 working journalists at 69 daily general-interest U.S. newspapers suggest that, while American journalists are overwhelmingly using e-mail to conduct both professional and personal business, it is unlikely, at least at this time, that very many are logging on to electronic discussion groups to discuss ethical issues.

Reporting on Private Affairs Of Public People: A Longitudinal Study of Newspaper Ethical Practices and Concerns, 1993-1999 • Sigman Splichal and Bruce Garrison, Miami • In 1987, after the Miami Herald reported that Democratic presidential hopeful Gary Hart had spent a night in a Washington D.C. townhouse with a young model, a national debate ensued over the proper bounds of reporting about the private lives of public officials. As that debate matured, the Washington Post’s Ben Bradlee summed it up: “ . . . the rules have certainly changed.” The New Republic also weighed in on the issue: The Herald had “opened a sluice gate that will not be easily closed.”

The Moral Authority of the Minnesota News Council: Statements of Principle and Uses of Precedent • Erik Forde Ugland and Jack Breslin, Minnesota • This study addresses the Minnesota News Council’s moral authority — that is, its ability to serve as a referent for the moral choices of others — and how its authority is affected by perceptions of its legitimacy. After analyzing all of the Council’s 125 written determinations, the authors argue that the Council’s legitimacy and authority could be enlarged by clearer statements of ethical principles, explicit expressions of standards of conduct, and more consistent references to precedent.

Testing A Theoretical Model of Journalistic Invasion of Privacy Using Structural Equation Modeling • Samuel P. Winch and L. Kim Tan, Nanyang Tech • Data on invasion of privacy — such as stories identifying crime victims, photographs of grieving people and stories about people’s financial status — obtained through a content analysis of newspapers over 30 years were analyzed with social/structural data such as literacy rate, crime rate and urbanization to validate a theoretical model of privacy using structural equation modeling. Tentatively, urbanization and industrialization seem to predict a decreased incidence in certain types of journalistic invasion of privacy.

<< 2000 Abstracts

Mass Communication and Society 2000 Abstracts

Mass Communication and Society Division

An E-Community of Ideas and Information: Media Content Characteristics of Children’s Web Sites • Debashis Aikat, North Carolina-Chapel Hill • The research for this study was based on concepts related to cultural studies and discourse analyses of top four mainstream children’s web sites based in the United States — Children’s Television Workshop (http://www.ctw.org/), Disney Online (http://www.disney.com/), Nickelodeon Online (http://www.nick.com/), and PBS Online (http://www.pbs.org). Using discourse analyses methods, this study examined media content characteristics of children’s web sites based on five specific construct categories: (a) Information, (b) Entertainment, (c) Education, (d) Commerce, and (e) Interactivity.

Quality Standards in Children’s Programming: An Empirical Analysis of Industry Claims • Alison Alexander, Louise Benjamin and Seok Kang, Georgia and Keisha Hoerrner, Louisiana • ABSTRACT NOT AVAILABLE.

Professional Autonomy and the American Journalist • Randal A. Beam, Indiana-Bloomington • This paper uses data from two national surveys of American journalists to examine the relationship between professional autonomy and the professional roles or functions that journalists embrace; the factors that journalists say influence their notion of what’s newsworthy; and the hypothetical judgments that journalists make about ethically questionable reporting practices. The purpose is to examine the ways in which reporters who have the freedom to pursue the stories that they want in the way that they want differ from reporters – apparently increasing in numbers – who face constraints in their work.

Mass Mediating Social Capital • Christopher E. Beaudoin and Esther Thorson, Missouri-Columbia • This study examines social capital in terms of its connections with news media use via a telephone survey. Positive links were found between social capital — defined in terms of group membership, voting behavior, and community trust — and exposure to news media, especially newspapers. The study suggests the importance age and ethnicity play in social capital — both as mediating factors and as predictors. The study, via structural equation modeling, suggests that causation flows in both directions between social capital and media exposure.

Access Denied: Records Custodians as Resistant Gatekeepers to Government Information • Michele Bush, Florida • Access to government information is a safeguard against government corruption by allowing the citizenry to keep watch over its leaders. Records custodians across the country are denying the citizenry this right. This paper shows the proliferation of records custodians unlawfully denying access to public information. It also shows that there is a lack of statutory guidance for records custodians across the country. This paper reports the problems and provides solutions for improving access to government information.

Television Viewing and Perceptions of Race, Socioeconomic Success, and Reasons For Lack Of Success • Rick W. Busselle and Heather Crandall, Washington State • This survey (N=139) investigates the relationships between television viewing and perceptions about socioeconomic success and failure among African-Americans Results extend previous research by indicating l) drama viewing was related to perceptions of greater educational disparity between blacks and whites and to perceptions that discrimination is a problem for blacks. 2) Sitcom viewing was related to perceptions of less educational disparity and higher estimates of blacks’ income. 3) News viewing was related to perceptions that relative lack of success is due to lack of motivation and not limited job opportunities.

Treating the Y2K Bug: Knowledge Gap Factors that Shaped the Outcome of a Public Issue • Francesca Dillman Carpentier, Alabama • ABSTRACT NOT AVAILABLE.

Whatever Works: A Test of the “Division of Labor Component of Uses and Gratifications Theory • John Carvalho, Campbell • ABSTRACT NOT AVAILABLE.

Rebels with a Cause: Teenagers on Daytime Dramas • Naeemah Clark, Florida • ABSTRACT NOT AVAILABLE.

The Effects of News Stories That Put Crime and Violence Into Context: Testing the Public Health Model of Reporting • Renita Coleman and Esther Thorson, Missouri • ABSTRACT NOT AVAILABLE.

Retreads: Recycling American Prime Time Television for Fun and Profit • Chad Dell, Monmouth • In the 1990s, a new television programming strategy seemed to emerge: “retreads,” the movement of prime time programs from one network to another. In 1995 alone, five cancelled programs found homes on another network’s schedule. This essay accounts for the use of retreads over a fifty-year period, including its resurgence in the 1990s. The essay argues that as one of many program recycling methods, retreads contribute to the alienation of television audiences.

Married sex in the movies: The last taboo? • J.M. Dempsey and Tom Reichert, North Texas • While other studies have incidentally addressed the portrayal of sex between married partners, this study specifically analyzes how sexuality between married couples is depicted in mainstream movies, as represented by the top movie video rentals of 1998 In the 25 motion pictures, married partners were portrayed in sexual behavior 16 times, or in 15% of the 105 codable sexual encounters. The most common sexual behavior portrayed among husbands and wives was passionate kissing.

Newspaper Letters and Phone-Mail to the Editor: A Comparison of Reader Input • Michael E. Dupre, Saint Anselm College and David A. Mackey, Framingham State College • ABSTRACT NOT AVAILABLE.

Partisan and Structural Balance of Election Stories on the 1998 Governor’s Race in Michigan • Frederick Fico and William Cote, Michigan State • The partisan and structural balance of newspaper stories covering the 1998 governor’s race in Michigan was assessed and compared to the newspaper coverage of three earlier elections. The 1998 election coverage favored the Democratic challenger in terms of space and prominence given his campaign’s assertions. A detailed issue analysis, however, suggests that the Republican incumbent was able to dominate the substantive issue agenda, while the Democratic challenger became himself the issue because of his insulting campaign comments.

Journalists’ Newsroom Roles and Their World Wide Web Search Habits • Bruce Garrison, Miami • This paper reports an analysis of how newsroom staff members search for information on the World Wide Web. Daily newspaper data collected in 1998 and 1999 were analyzed to determine if computer-assisted reporting supervisors, news researchers, general assignment and beat reporters, news editors, and newsroom technical specialists differed in how they searched for information on the Web. Findings indicated that there are clear differences in how the group members search.

World Wide Web Use In Newsrooms, 1997-99 • Bruce Garrison, Miami • This study focuses on the use of the Internet and World Wide Web in daily newspaper newsrooms during a three-year period covering 1997-99. The study focused on how these news organizations used the Web to find information, the Web sites most often used for newsgathering, what journalists perceived as the strengths and weaknesses of information found, the Web-based interactive technologies most often used, and the perceived advantages and disadvantages of Web reporting.

Effects of Media Coverage on Illicit Drug Trial Among College Students: What Does Curiosity Really do to the Cat? • Alyse R. Gotthoffer, Miami • This study examines the effects of media coverage on college students’ intentions to try illicit drugs. An experiment was performed with 172 undergraduate students to determine whether awareness, interest, and product curiosity affected intention to try a fictitious drug, MCA. Students were asked to listen to one of six radio segments with drug messages embedded in them. The results suggest that among students predisposed to try illicit drugs, repeated exposure to drug messages heightens awareness, interest, and curiosity about drugs, which, in turn, leads to an intention to try new drugs.

Morality and the Maintenance of Order: The Instructional Potential of “The Jerry Springer Show” • Mary Elizabeth Grabe, Indiana • The prevalence of verbal and physical aggression on daytime television talk shows has earned this genre the designation of “confrontainment.” In recent times politicians, clergy, and media critics have drawn attention by making castigating remarks about the content of particularly “The Jerry Springer Show.” Media scholars have gathered on the sideline of this scuffle to express opinions and offer research evidence to either defend talk shows as democratizing or expel them from the menu of morally just television fare.

The Incidence and Nature of Altruism in Primetime Television Programming • James K. Hertog and Mike Farrell, Kentucky • ABSTRACT NOT AVAILABLE.

Entertainment Media Use and Attitudes Concerning Women’s Rights: Merging Qualitative and Quantitative Approaches to Better Understand a Process of Media Effects • R. Lance Holbert, Dhavan V. Shah and Nojin Kwak, Wisconsin-Madison • Critical feminist scholars have long argued that the consumption of televised entertainment programming, because it is a site of gender role construction and contestation, plays an important role in shaping attitudes toward women and their place in society. Merging these insights with research on media uses and gratifications, we posit that individual-level differences in basic demographic characteristics, value-preferences, and social orientations motivate in the use of various types of recreational and informational media content.

Community Controversy and the News Media: A Network Structure of Community Actors’ Co-Coverage in the Local Newspapers • Naewon Kang, Wisconsin-Madison • This study uses network analysis to investigate how the community actors were covered together in news articles of the two local newspapers over a controversial school pairing policy in Madison, Wisconsin. By examining the co-coverage pattern, the author analyzes a symmetrical matrix of 133 community actors appearing in 132 news articles published during 1992 to 1995. Bonacich centrality and multidimensional analysis demonstrate that individuals who are involved in institutional organizations occupy central positions in the co-coverage network.

A Multilevel Approach to Civic Participation: Individual Length of Residence, Neighborhood Residential Stability, and their Interactive Effects with Media Use • Naewon Kang and Nojin Kwak, Wisconsin-Madison • Adopting the Sampson’s (1991) multilevel system model, this study attempts to investigate the role of residential variables both at the individual and at the neighborhood levels and communication factors in individuals’ civic participation. Findings in this study show the significant impact of both residential variables, individual length of residence and neighborhood residential stability, and support past evidences on the influence of communication behaviors on civic participation.

From Here to Obscurity: Media Substitution Theory and the Internet • Barbara K. Kaye, Valdosta State and Thomas J. Johnson, Southern Illinois • ABSTRACT NOT AVAILABLE.

Internet Uses and Gratifications: Understanding Motivations for Using the Internet • Hanjun Ko, Florida • In this study, the uses and gratifications theory was applied to investigate the Internet users’ motivations and their relationship with attitudes toward the Internet as well as types of Web site visited by users. Four motivations and five types of Web sites were discovered via factor analysis. Differences among heavy, medium, and light users of the Internet were also analyzed in terms of their motivations, types of Web sites frequently visited, and attitudes toward the Internet.

A Framing Analysis: How Did Three U.S. News Magazines Frame About Mergers or Acquisitions? • Sang Hee Kweon, Southern Illinois • The study examined news coverage of the mergers based on the types of mergers, government policy, and news focus of the three U.S. news magazines. This study found that all three magazines covered mergers or acquisitions favorably, particularly media mergers, and mergers news coverage was 35.3% (183) episodic and 64.5% (335) thematic. Fortune, a business-focused magazine, covered non-media mergers more favorably, whereas Newsweek and U.S. News & World Report covered media mergers more favorably than non-media mergers.

Pleasure, Reality, and Hegemony: A Television Drama and Women in a Korean Confucian Patriarchal Family Structure • Oh-Hyeon Lee, Massachusetts • ABSTRACT NOT AVAILABLE.

Political Talk, Not All “Hot Air” A Path Model Predicting Knowledge, Cynicism & Vote in an Issue Campaign • Glenn Leshner and Maria E. Len-Rios, Missouri • This study used regional telephone survey data collected after a 1999 off-season issue election to examine how campaign media and interpersonal political discussion predict how much voters learned about the issue, how they voted, and how politically cynical they were. Three distinct types of voters were identified: those who thought the issue was important, those who reported being involved in the campaign, and those who relied on endorsements to decide how to vote.

The Role of Response Efficacy in Health Threat Messages • Yulian Li, Minnesota • ABSTRACT NOT AVAILABLE.

City Characteristics of Newspaper Coverage of Social Security Reform: A Community Structure Approach • John C. Pollock, Tiffany Tanner and Mike Delbene, College of New Jersey • Utilizing the community structure approach developed by Tichenor, Donohue, and Olien (1973, 1980) and elaborated by Pollock and others (1977, 1978, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999), a set of hypotheses were tested to discover the relationship between city characteristics and newspaper reporting on Social Security reform. This approach suggests that certain demographics within a community are systematically linked to newspaper reporting on critical issues.

Thinking About Health: The Relationship of Mass Media and Cognition to Perceptions of Children’s Health • Bryan H. Reber, Missouri • How media use and cognitive work contribute to perceptions of children’s health and quality of life issues was tested in a survey of 1,238 adults. Demographics were predictors of cognitive work and media use on children’s health issues. High cognitive work on children’s health issues was significantly related to pessimistic perceptions about the status of children’s health. High television exposure and attention were related to optimistic perceptions. Cognitive work led to more accurate assessments of the health situation.

Perceptions of Media Fairness: Implications for The Nixon And Clinton Legacies • Marilyn S. Roberts, Florida and Thomas J. Johnson, Southern Illinois • The study examines perceptions of the Watergate and Lewinsky scandals. Survey data (n=450) was collected after the Senate rejected articles of impeachment against President Clinton. Three questions asked about the scandals: whether their actions were serious enough to warrant being forced out of office; perceptions of corruptness; and whether the media were out to get them. Included are measures of demographic and political variables to determine significant associations and implications for the two Presidential legacies.

Telemedicine versus Telelaw: A Legal Comparison Between Offering the Services of Doctors and Lawyers over the Internet • Johanna M. Roodenburg, Florida • This paper compares the movement of the services of doctors and lawyers onto the Internet. It finds that doctors are moving online at a more rapid pace than lawyers. The paper examines the policy rationale for the different telemovement pace between the two professions.

Co-use and Co-processing of News Media in the Family: An Explication and Empirical Validation • Christian Sandvig and Melissa Nichols Saphir, Stanford and Steven Chaffee, California • This study considers the sharing of media in the family by developing two concepts similar to co-viewing and mediation but that apply to communication media other than television. Termed co-use and co-processing, this paper first explicates these concepts, then presents preliminary empirical evidence that these concepts exist from a survey of parent-adolescent pairs. We find that families widely co-use media other than television, mutually co-process content from these media, and that adolescents often initiate co-processing.

An ‘Improbable Leap’: A Content Analysis of Newspaper Coverage of Hillary Clinton’s Transition from First Lady to Senate Candidate • Erica Scharrer, Massachusetts-Amherst • This study is primarily a quantitative content analysis of newspaper coverage of Hillary Clinton as she makes an unprecedented transition from first lady to senate candidate. 342 newspaper stories are analyzed to determine whether the press has responded to her adoption of non-traditional roles with a negative tone. 96 stories about Giuliani are used for comparison, and a qualitative analysis of negative statements appearing in news stories adds depth and dimension to the discussion of critical tone.

Media Cue-Taking and Trends in Mass Opinion: Explaining Evaluations of ClintonÕs Competency and Integrity • Dhavan V. Shahm Wisconsin-Madison; David Domke, Washington; Mark D. Watts, Abacus Associates and David P. Fan, Minnesota • Contrary to what might be expected according to many models of media effects and public opinion, President Clinton’s job approval ratings remained high – and even slightly rose – during the period of critical coverage surrounding the Monica Lewinsky debacle. At the same time, although it received much less attention, public evaluations of the President’s integrity plummeted. With these public opinion divergences in mind, several pollsters, pundits, and scholars have argued that news media must have been largely irrelevant.

The Impact of Political Advertising: Differences Between Positive Ads and Issue, Image and Mixed Attacks • Sung Wook Shim, Florida • The purpose of this study is to identify the impact on the attacking candidate when he/she attacks the attacked candidate with four types of ads: issue, image attacks, both issue and image combined attacks and positive. The study results show that image attack produced a greater negative change than issue attack for evaluation of attacking candidate. The decline was significant between likelihood of voting for attacking candidate in the pretest and likelihood of voting for attacking candidate in the posttest.

Media Bias, Campaign Coverage, and Public Opinion: The 2000 New York Senate Race • Young Jun Son and Deborah Soun Chung, Indiana • This study examines the linkage between candidate treatment and public opinion during the ongoing 2000 New York Senate race and tests T. Patterson’s media candidate portrayal models. With evidence of political bias, our findings demonstrate the New York Times and the Washington Times were respectively favorable to Mrs. Clinton, the Democrat, and to Rudolph Giuliani, the Republican. In the visual part, we did not find specific media bias. We could not support Patterson’s models both in the written and the visual part.

Exploration of TV-Free Life Style • Toward a Media Exchange Model • Tao Sun and Tsan-Kuo Chang, Minnesota • ABSTRACT NOT AVAILABLE.

Influence of Spouse Communication and Informational Media on Risk Perception • Eun-Ho Yeo and Clifford W. Scherer, Cornell • This study used a path model to examine the influence of two communication behaviors on risk perception. Spouse communication, talking about health issues, and mass communication, use of informational media, particularly print, was used to predict husband and wife personal risk perception and societal risk perception. The focus of the paper is to examine the possibility that the impact of informational mass media on risk perception is mediated by family interaction, particularly husband-wife communication.

Economic Literacy and News Interest • Lowndes F. Stephens, South Carolina • The National Council on Economic Education, the Federal Reserve, the U.S. Department of Education (Goals 2000 Educate American Act) and other organizations are promoting economic literacy. In this investigation the author tests, and finds support for, two hypotheses (using a random telephone survey sample of 369 residents in a Southern metropolitan area) – that interest in economic, business, and personal finance news is strongly and positively correlated with economic literacy, and with estimated financial net worth.

Exporting the First Amendment a Case of the Fair Report Privilege • Kyu Ho Youm, Arizona State • Under the fair report privilege doctrine of American libel law, “[t]he publication of defamatory matter concerning another in a report of an official action or proceeding or of a meeting open to the public that deals with a matter of public concern is privileged if the report is accurate and complete or a fair abridgment of the occurrence reported.” Regardless of how it is formulated, the answer to the question of whether reports of the proceedings of foreign courts and other agencies fall within the fair report privilege in U.S. law carries profound implications for American news media in global communication.

An Interdisciplinary Synthesis of Framing • Weiwu Zhang, Wisconsin-Madison • This paper provides a multidisciplinary treatment of the framing analysis and pays close attention to the framing processes linking its antecedents, contents, and consequences. The antecedents of framing addresses the issue of how frames are constructed in the first place and how these influences interact with news media routines to influence actual media content frames. The consequences of media content frames deal with the extent to which media frames are adopted by audience members.

<< 2000 Abstracts

Magazine 2000 Abstracts

Magazine Division

The Portrayal of Black Women’s Facial Features in Mainstream Fashion Magazines: 1989-1998 • Oluwatosin Adegbola, Howard • The method of content analysis was applied to three mainstream fashion magazines (Vogue, Glamour, and Cosmopolitan; randomly sampled from 1989-1998), to investigate claims of stereotypical portrayals. The women were coded on complexion, lip size, nose width, and hairstyle with attainable scores in categories ranging from very Caucasian to very Negroid. Results showed that there was a pattern whereby majority of the Black women in the magazines possessed Caucasian features.

Cosmetic Ads in Cosmopolitan and New Woman: Do Advertisers get Special Treatment in Editorial? • Elizabeth Althoff, Drake • Advertisers seek increasingly large concessions from magazines they advertise, as evidenced by recent RFPs from agencies. In this study, cosmetic ads are compared with editorial treatment of the advertiser’s brand in two women’s magazines, Cosmopolitan and New Woman, 1997 to 1999. While Cosmo mentioned only 21 brands in editorial, 19% of these were also advertisers in the same issue. New Woman mentioned 37 brands, but only 8% of these were advertisers.

Setting the Agenda and Framing in Beauty Magazines: A Content Analysis of the Coverage of Breasts • Julie L. Andsager, Washington State and Angela Powers and Rachael McKinness, Northern Illinois • This study uses two content analysis methods to examine how four women’s beauty magazines framed information concerning the health and beauty of breasts during the 1990s. Breast cancer prevention and risk was the most prominent theme, while implants received little attention. Cancer was associated with fear and danger. Breast size was a recurring frame, linking breasts to sexual attractiveness. Medical doctors were the most frequent sources used. Magazines varied in how they framed breast issues.

‘Pearl Harbor of the Cold War:’ Coverage of Post-Sputnik Science Reforms In Four National Magazines • Timothy E. Bajkiewicz, North Carolina-Chapel Hill • Sputnik was a rallying cry for American science education. This study found eighty-six articles on this topic in four national magazines: Popular Science, Scientific American, Life, and the Saturday Evening Post, from October, 1957 to September, 1958. All called for immediate changes. The articles used examples of students and teachers, expert opinion, and scientific studies regarding attitudes and the state of science education in both the United States and the Soviet Union.

Farm Magazine Advertisers Turn Up the Heat: An Analysis of Ethical Pressures Faced by Farm Magazine Writers • Stephen A. Banning, Texas A&M • The traditionally small advertising base for farm magazine publications has continued to shrink. This study looks at kinds of pressures farm magazine writers may be feeling as they become dependent on fewer and fewer advertisers. Results of this nationwide survey indicate farm magazine writers feel advertisers are applying a great deal of pressure in areas of ethical concern. When compared with the same instrument given to a similar sample pool a decade before, the study indicates a general feeling that the amount of pressure from advertisers has increased.

Twenty-Five Years of Newsweek’s Coverage of Salvador Allende and Augusto Pinochet: A-Content Analysis • Matthew M. Bifano, Ohio • Through a longitudinal study using a content analysis, the researcher demonstrated that Newsweek’s coverage during the 1970 election of Salvador Allende, his presidency, the military coup in 1973, and Augusto Pinochet’s presidency tended to follow the U.S. government’s foreign policy. Newsweek’s dependence on official news sources and its failure to use human rights groups as sources made its coverage hegemonic rather than independent from the various U.S. administrations’ policies toward Chile.

Yosemite’s Transition from Space to Place: An Historical Investigation in Media’s Role in the Place-Making Process • Nickieann Fleener and Edward Ruddell, Utah • ABSTRACT NOT AVAILABLE.

AOL-Time Warner’s Magazine and Music Interests: Good Business Makes Poor Journalism • Geoffrey P. Hull, Middle Tennessee State • This study examines two publications of AOL-Time Warner, Time and People Weekly, to determine whether they give more coverage or more favorable coverage to products and artists of Time Warner’s music division. One year of issues of each publication was examined. Time and People do devote more total coverage to Time Warner distributed recordings and artists than to those of their competitors Qualitative measures of the coverage found no significant differences.

Women’s Political Voices: A Content Analysis of The Political Coverage in Women’s Magazines • Stacey J.T. Hust, Washington State • Political coverage in women’s magazines has seldom been studied, but as an integral component of women’s media consumerism, it is important to discern how they cover important issues. Research reports that women do not have access to political information and are not conditioned to be involved in the political process. A content analysis is used to analyze the political coverage of nine magazines over a five-year period.

‘A Death in the American Family’: National Values and Memory in the Magazine Mourning of John F. Kennedy Jr. • Carolyn Kitch, Temple • The 1999 death of John F. Kennedy Jr. provided an opportunity for news media to tell a life story as a way of assessing the American character, defining it in terms of family and generation and in terms of sacrifice and redemption. Focusing on magazines a medium that played a leading role in the public mourning of JFK Jr. • this paper analyzes the narrative and ritual aspects of the coverage in order to understand journalism’s role in affirming national values and creating collective memory.

The National Geographic Magazine and Environmental Coverage, 1970-1980 • Jan Knight, Ohio • ABSTRACT NOT AVAILABLE.

A Comparison of Magazine Summer Olympic Coverage by Gender and Race: A Content Analysis of Sports Illustrated • Jim Mack, Ohio • This study content analyzed 212 Summer Olympic articles in Sports Illustrated, seeking to find if the magazine provided representative coverage of women and minority U.S. athletes. The total U.S. medal winners for race and gender divisions was compared to the number of pictures and print references to U.S. athletes in Olympic articles from 1960 to 1996. This study found that, quantitatively, Sports Illustrated did provide representative coverage of female and minority athletes for the Summer Olympics.

Framing a War: Photographic Coverage of the Kosovo War in Newsweek, Time, and U.S. News & World Report • Nikolina Sajn, Kwangju Heo and Sarah Merritt, North Carolina • This paper studies framing of the photographic coverage of the Kosovo War in three U.S. newsmagazines. The quantitative content analysis of the photographs showed that the coverage concentrated on the U.S. leaders, troops and arsenal. The photographs of civilians showed almost exclusively just the Albanian side. The magazines failed to inform the public about all aspects of the war, and the traditional “good vs. evil” paradigm applies in the coverage of this confrontation.

American Magazines Prosper-At Whose Expense • David Sumner, Ball State • Conflicting evidence exists regarding whether consumers or advertisers pay most of the costs of magazine publishing for the industry as a whole. The purpose of this study is to look at the evidence by analyzing rates charged for both circulation and advertising, focusing on data from 1980 to 1998. It compares subscription prices, single copy prices, and advertising per-page rates for 96 major magazines monitored by the Audit Bureau of Circulations that were published continuously between 1980 and 1998.

Lillian Ross: Pioneer of Literary Journalism • James W. Tankard, Jr., Texas • Lillian Ross has reported for The New Yorker for more than 50 years. This paper argues that Ross has not been given sufficient credit for her contributions to the style known as literary journalism. Ross used dialogue and the technique of writing articles made up mostly of scenes to write such articles as her classic “Portrait of Hemingway.” She also pioneered the non-fiction novel form in her book Picture • years before Capote’s In Cold Blood.

The Relationship Between Health and Fitness Magazine Reading and Eating-Disordered Weight-Loss Methods Among High School Girls • Steven R. Thomsen, Michelle M. Weber and Lora Beth Brown, Brigham Young • The study examined the relationship between reading women’s health and fitness magazines and the use of eating-disordered diet methods (laxatives, appetite suppressants/diet pills, skipping two meals a day, intentional vomiting, excessive exercising, and restricting calories to 1,200 a day or less) among a group of 498 high school girls. The authors found moderate, positive associations between reading frequency and these unhealthful behaviors, which are often the first steps toward the development of anorexia nervosa or bulimia nervosa.

The Amazing Magazines of Hugo Gernsback • Jonathan Thornton, Trinity • In 1908, Hugo Gernsback foresaw the future of science fiction, helping to define it as an influential and popular genre through his magazine Amazing Stories. Throughout his life, Gernsback was a dreamer who would strongly influence the genre of science fiction magazines, from serializing “Ralph 124C41+” in Modern Electrics, to his peak of launching and editing the first all-science fiction magazine, to the post-Amazing Stories era of his life when he published several science fiction magazines.

Hidden Under a Bushel: A Study of the Thriving World of Religious Magazine • Ken Waters, Pepperdine • Religious publications have a long and varied history in the United States. The publications are among the first magazines to appear in the U.S. and their content helped shape the early Republic’s literacy, morals and political events. But during the past 150 years, their influence has lessened. Although some 3,000 religious publications exist today, most report small circulation levels. Critics contend that many religious magazines are more focused on doctrinal battles than presenting news and information for the general public.

<< 2000 Abstracts

Law 2000 Abstracts

Law Division

Determining Fame under the Federal Trademark Dilution Act of 1995 • Sue Westcott Alessandri, North Carolina • Because of the law’s newness, the true effect of the Federal Trademark Dilution Act of 1995 has yet to be seen. The small body of precedents, however, may serve to guide corporations required to provide evidence on the “fame” of their trademarks in FTDA cases. An analysis of the five reported cases heard thus far by the U.S. Courts of Appeals – and specifically two circuits’ decisions in determining the fame of a trademark – shows that advertising history, expenditures and market research may be the best evidence corporations can present.

Broadening the Scope of the Newsgathering Privilege to Protect Nontraditional Journalists: A Definitional Dilemma • Laurence B. Alexander, Florida • This paper explores the statutory and common law development of the journalist’s privilege, giving special attention to the parameters drawn to limit protection only to those who work in traditional roles in traditional news organizations. It also examines the widely accepted “checking value” theory of Vincent Blasi on the role that news-source confidentiality plays in serving as an additional check on abuses of government power. This underlying theory is considered in determining whether the journalist’s privilege should be expanded beyond its current scope.

The First Amendment & Postmodern Tendencies in Cyberspace • Justin Brown, Penn State • To address the possibilities and difficulties of expression on the Internet, legal scholars and courts have been articulating jurisprudence. While many have been boastful of a robust marketplace of ideas, missing from the discourse has been an examination of the postmodern tendencies of cyberspace. This paper reviews developing jurisprudence and offers a unique perspective of how the First Amendment may protect expression in the cultural environments of converging and evolving media.

The “Enticing Images” Doctrine: An Emerging Principle in First Amendment Jurisprudence? • Clay Calvert, Penn State • The split of authority among the federal appellate courts that emerged in 1999 concerning the Child Pornography Prevention Act’s prohibition of “virtual” child pornography presents a propitious opportunity to examine the emergence of a nascent principle in First Amendment jurisprudence • the enticing images doctrine. Under this doctrine, otherwise lawful images of fictional content can be prohibited because they “entice” or “seduce” minors to engage in illegal conduct. The roots of the doctrine take hold in more than just the CPPA.

Silencing Foreign Voices: Restrictions on Alien Ownership of Broadcast Stations • James V. D’Aleo • North Carolina • Broadcast ownership provisions have been present in American society in some form or another since 1912. The time has come for these restrictions to be lifted. The current provisions have been in place, with little variation, since the Communications Act of 1934. This paper argues that the original reasoning for these provisions no longer hold true in today’s society, indicating that foreign ownership restrictions should be lifted or relaxed.

First Amendment Rights of Non-Citizens In Light of Reno v. Arab American Anti-Discrimination Committee • Irina Dmitrieva, Florida • The article argues that in a recent case, Reno v. Arab American Anti-Discrimination Committee, the U.S. Supreme Court de facto denied the First Amendment rights to non-citizens in the immigration context. The article argues that denial of free speech rights to aliens robs this country of the valuable source of new ideas and beliefs, and impedes the process of cultural exchange among U.S. citizens and immigrants.

State Protection of Copyright Interest In Primary Law Materials • Irina Dmitrieva, Florida • The article demonstrates that at least half of 50 states claim copyright interest in their primary law materials, such as state statutes, court reports, and administrative regulations. At the same time, state control over primary law materials may restrict public access to legal documents of vital importance. The author suggests changes in the United States copyright law that would deny copyright protection to the texts of state statutes and judicial opinions.

Contracting the News: A Study of Online News User Agreements • Victoria Smith Ekstrand, North Carolina • The terms of user agreements on news Web sites represent a new paradigm in the sale of news. Rather than selling the news, today’s online publishers provide content in exchange for agreement to the conditions of user agreements. This study examines the provisions in online news user agreements. It finds that such agreements duplicate or exceed protections provided by existing law and will be strengthened by new Uniform Commercial Code legislation.

The Lochner Monster Redux: Buckley and The Path of Legal Realism in Today’s Campaign Finance Jurisprudence • Emily Erickson, Syracuse • This paper examines the parallel often drawn between Buckley v. Valeo and Lochner v. New York, exploring the progressive legal realist agenda that helped end the Lochner era and recent attempts by the Supreme Court to both escape and hide within the bowels of its own “Lochner monster,” Buckley. It then looks at the most recent campaign finance precedents, including January’s Nixon v. Shrink decision, to discern whether today’s Court seems able and willing to slay Buckley.

Reconsidering the Federal Journalist’s Privilege for Nonconfidential Information: Gonzalez v. NBC • Anthony L. Fargo, Rhode Island • In 1998, the Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in Gonzalez v. NBC ruled that there was no federal journalist’s privilege for nonconfidential information. The case appeared to go against precedent in the Second Circuit and appeared to be a serious blow to journalists’ efforts to expand the privilege to other circuits. However, a year later, the Second Circuit reconsidered Gonzalez and held that there was a privilege for nonconfidential information.

The Supreme Court’s Heavy Hand: The Reversal of Libel Decisions • Mike Farrell, Kentucky • The Supreme Court has near-total control of its docket, each year considering less than 100 of the seven thousand appeals it receives. When the Court grants certiorari, it is a signal the justices are more likely to reverse the decision of the lower federal court or the state court. An earlier study found the Supreme Court reversed the lower court in more than 60 percent of the cases it decided between 1953-90.

The Malice Muddle: The Changing Definition of Malice And Its Threat To The Fair Report Privilege • Deborah Gump, North Carolina • Suppose a mayor accused a councilmember at a town meeting of selling drugs. Next, suppose the reporter from the Daily Banner was told by his editor to forget about the accusation because the mayor’s libel suit would bankrupt the paper. Wouldn’t happen, you say? Under new court interpretations of the fair report privilege, it might. The privilege protects reporters from libel suits if they cover official proceedings accurately, fairly, and without common law malice.

Policy of Secrecy, Pattern of Deception: How the Government Tried to Undermine Press Freedom and the Right to Know During the Federalist Period • Martin E. Halstuk, Nevada-Las Vegas • The Supreme Court has consistently rejected arguments that the First Amendment provides the press with any rights not also afforded to the general public. The purpose of this paper is to explore the question of whether there is an historical basis to argue for constitutionally protected newsgathering privileges for the press. To illuminate this issue, this examination focuses on several events that took place between 1787 and 1798.

Circumventing Copyright with Controlling Technology • Matt Jackson, Penn State • The Digital Millennium Copyright Act added a new chapter to Copyright Act that protects the anti-circumvention technology used by copyright owners to restrict access to their content. In Universal City Studios v. Reimerdes, the first case involving these new provisions, the district court held that traditional defenses to copyright infringement did not apply to some violations of the anti-circumvention provisions. The DMCA and the Reimerdes case is evidence of a paradigm shift in copyright from a legal concept to a technological concept.

Libel in 48 Points: How Courts Have Ruled since Sullivan on Allegedly False and Defamatory Headlines Atop Accurate Stories • Susan Keith, North Carolina • The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit ruled in late 1999 that a headline could be actionable for libel on its own, even when the story to which it referred was substantially accurate. This no doubt pleased the plaintiff in the case, actor Brian “Kato” Kaelin, who had sued the National Examiner, a supermarket tabloid, over the headline “Cops Think Kato Did It.” However, the ruling also brought to the forefront the fact that some courts consider allegedly libelous headlines in context of the accompanying stories while others do not.

Web Site Framing: Copyright Infringement Through the Creation of an Unauthorized Derivative Work • Greg Lisby, Georgia State • The technological explosion and convergence that are the Internet and the World Wide Web • increasing amounts of information from a variety of sources, coupled with the accelerating change in the form of that information, from discrete media into one constant barrage of digitized bits • have posed new problems for copyright that promise to shake the law to its 300-year-old print media foundations. Take framing, as an example.

Hands in the “Cookie” Jar: Disclosure of Internet Transaction Generated Information under State Public Records Law • Harlen Makemson, North Carolina • This paper analyzed whether Internet transaction generated information such as cookie files are subject to disclosure under state freedom of information statutes and whether such information could fall under trade secret exemptions. For states that define public records as those made in connection with public business, disclosing cookies makes intuitive sense and is consistent with the legislative intent of broad access. Current laws leave courts ill-equipped to rule on the disclosure of cookie files.

Journalists on Journalistic Conduct in the Law of Libel • Tracie L. Mauriello and Thomas A. Schwartz, Ohio State • The U.S. Supreme Court’s requirement that libel plaintiffs show fault on the part of defendants has generated a body of law that examines journalistic conduct. Some see this as a threat to press freedom. After analyzing the responses of journalists to two libel case scenarios, this paper finds that journalists have higher standards for the practice of journalism than those of the Court and that they expect to be held legally accountable for journalistic malpractice but that they are unable to articulate a sense of proper journalistic conduct.

A Safeguard for National Security or a Wall of Secrecy Protecting Government Agencies? • Nelson Mumma Jr., North Carolina • The Freedom of Information Act was created to ensure that ordinary American citizens have access to government agency documents. This is important because it theoretically keeps the government accountable and allows individuals to access information they might need to knowledgeably vote and participate in the democratic process. However, Congress created nine exemptions to the FOIA, which allow government agencies to withhold information under certain conditions. Exemption 1 allows agencies to withhold documents if the release of these documents could harm national security or foreign relations.

Violence against the Press in Latin America: Protections and Remedies in International Law • Michael Perkins, Brigham Young • This paper analyzes recent cases decided by international human-rights tribunals that found attacks against journalists to be violations of the free-expression guarantees of the American Convention on Human Rights, the western hemisphere’s leading human-rights treaty. This study argues that the American Convention’s guarantees are being interpreted as demanding strict accountability from governments for investigating complaints of violence against the press, punishing journalists’ assailants, and indemnifying their survivors.

William Lloyd Garrison, Bejamin Lundy & Seditious Libel • Amy Reynolds, Oklahoma • This paper explores early attempts to suppress abolitionist speech and discusses how those attempts helped shape the views of two leading abolitionist figures. In response to efforts to suppress their speech and presses, Garrison and Lundy began to raise questions about what free speech and free press meant and brought public attention to issues of free expression. They also illustrated the power the press had to illuminate these issues.

Counter Speech 2000: A New Look at the Old Remedy for “Bad” Speech • Robert Richards and Clay Calvert, Penn State • The doctrine of counter speech was firmly implanted in First Amendment jurisprudence by Justice Brandeis nearly three-quarters of a century ago. This article revisits this well-worn doctrine. In particular, it analyzes its strengths and weaknesses through the prism of an eclectic collection of five very recent controversies in which counter speech has been employed as an antidote to “bad” speech. The medium and the message in each case is different, stretching from messages of tolerance on billboards to counteract the effects of hate speech to videos available on the World Wide Web to ward off the effects of an allegedly negative television program.

Reno v. Condon: Regulating State Public Records as Commodities in an Information Marketplace • Joey Senat, Oklahoma State • In upholding the Driver’s Privacy Protection Act, the Supreme Court granted Congress the constitutional authority under the Commerce Clause to override state FOI laws in order to restrict disclosure of drivers’ license data. The Court treated states as database owners and public records as commodities in interstate commerce. This paper argues that the Court should have adopted the reasoning of those lower courts that struck down the statute as a federal infringement upon states’ rights.

Defining the Concept of “Harmful to Minors “ in the Age of the Internet • Barbara Smith, Florida • For over 150 years, the United States government has emphasized the importance of protecting children from harm, especially in the area of sexually explicit material. However, society’s definition of pornography and determinants of harm have changed over time. Moreover, the emergence of the Internet has posed a challenge for government regulators. This paper proposes solutions to ensure that the government’s interest in protecting minors from Internet content is carried out in the least restrictive manner.

Freedom of the Private-University Student Press: A Constitutional Proposal • Brian J. Steffen, Simpson College • While the First Amendment protects public-university student journalists from censorship by the state, students at private universities are without constitutional protection from censorship. Courts usually have been unwilling to recognize First Amendment rights on the private campus, partly because most advocates of free-press rights have argued that the Constitution should apply with equal force on public and private campuses. This paper calls for a balancing of the First Amendment interests of the students against the pedagogical and philosophical interests of the private institution.

Tainted Sources, Matters of Public Concern: Applying the Wiretapping Laws to Media Disclosures • Josie Tullos, SUNY-Brockport • The ease of electronic eavesdropping has again raised the troublesome problem of balancing the tension between the First Amendment and personal privacy. That tension seemed overwhelming in two recent cases involving disclosure penalties in wiretapping statutes. The cases left Circuits divided and indicate that closer attention needs to be paid to the privacy concerns underlying the statutes. This paper suggests that a better approach is to look at privacy law as an aspect of community.

Pleading the Fifth: Media Economics, Free Air Time, & the Fifth Amendment • Glenda C. Williams, Alabama • Campaign finance reformers often use the concept of “free air time” as an incentive for voluntary compliance (compelling television stations to provide free advertising time for federal candidates). This paper outlines arguments from both proponents and opponents of free air time, with special emphasis on the two interpretations of “public interest.” Media economic theory is then used to support the argument that free air time would indeed take the property created by broadcasters: their audience.

<< 2000 Abstracts

International Communication 2000 Abstracts

International Communication Division

Open Competition
The Absence of Fairness in Philippine Newspapers • Geri M. Alumit, Michigan State • Content analysis results of two newspapers, Malaya and Manila Bulletin in the Philippines, show little fairness in the coverage of the Catholic Church in the Philippines. Interviews with reporters and editors at those two newspapers suggest that fairness is not an objective of Philippine journalism, and is also the product of other factors such as laziness, “press release journalism” and “envelopmental journalism.”

Dutch Audience’s Use and Interpretation of Economic News First Results From a Cross-National Explorative Study • Florann Arts, The Amsterdam School of Communications Research • In this paper focus groups show that the public’s relative disinterest in hard economic news is caused by the perceived gap between the issues covered and people’s daily lives. Television programs are perceived to increase the tangibility of economic news. Also, trust in the accuracy of economic coverage was found to be related to people’s confidence in the future state of the economy. The results furthermore suggest that people believe economic news does have more impact on others than on themselves.

Values Representations in International News • Christopher E. Beaudoin and Esther Thorson, Missouri-Columbia • This study sets forth a values approach to understanding international news coverage in a prestige American newspaper. Via a content analysis, a system of 13 values — including altruism, freedom, materialism, and peace — was examined in terms of how foreign nations, groups, and individuals were represented. Conflict values were clustered, as were positive values. Asia was stereotyped as materialistic, Western Europe as beautiful, Africa as power ridden, and the Eastern bloc as concerned with the value of security.

Myths and News Narratives: Toward a Comparative Perspective for the Study of News Content • Dan Berkowitz, Iowa and Hillel Nossek, Tel-Aviv • Comparative research across cultures provides a fruitful terrain for research into myths and narratives that are embedded into news content. This study offers a nexis of structuralist and ethnographic approaches that offers a conceptual complement for that vein of research. Following a conceptual discussion, the paper addresses methodological considerations and offers and scheme for conducting research with a cross-cultural research team.

This case study examines media literacy as it relates to the encoding Media Literacy And India’s Ramayan In Nepal: Are TV Aesthetics Universal Or Culture-Bound? • Elizabeth Burch, Sonoma State • This case study examines media literacy as it relates to the encoding and decoding of messages intended for non-western viewers. A qualitative methodology of contextual aesthetics examines how production techniques clarified and intensified the narrative of Ramayan • one of India’s first Hindu soap operas produced for television and aired in India and Nepal in the late 1980s. The purpose is to identify whether televisual conventions are culturally-bound or universal. The study finds that culture plays a key role in the way television messages are constructed and perhaps interpreted.

Linkages of International and Local News • Gene Burd, Texas-Austin • This study of how five daily newspapers made local tie-ins to international news on page one covers the month of January 1999 for the Boston Globe, Atlanta Journal Constitution, Chicago Tribune, Dallas Morning News and San Francisco Chronicle-Examiner. It surveys research on criteria for international news, professionals’ worries about scanty resources and skewed priorities, and the sparse training and textbook guides for both staff and free-lancers connecting “main street” to the larger world whose political boundaries are being dissolved by the electronic and natural environment.

From Globalization to Localization: World’s Leading Television News Broadcasters in Asia • Yu-li Chang, Ohio • This paper addresses globalization of CNNI, BBC World, and CNBC in Asia by analyzing and comparing program schedules of these three broadcasters. Globalization for them means adopting regionalization and localization in their programming strategies. CNBC Asia leads in its efforts of localization, followed by BBC World. While CNNI Asia Pacific has not moved beyond regionalization, it may soon adopt localization in Asia.

The Image of Muslims as Terrorists in Major U.S. Newspapers • Natalya Chernyshova, Washington and Lee University/American University in Bulgaria • ABSTRACT NOT AVAILABLE.

Discrepancy of Gratifications of Online News Readers • Jung-Yui Cho, Alabama • Discrepancy of gratifications of online news among U.S. and foreign readers was investigated based on different themes of gratifications including remote access, immediacy, surveillance, and entertainment. The discrepancy between GS and GO was demonstrated to be of statistical significance. Besides, due to the fact that online news provides instant access to hometown news anywhere in the world, international participants of the survey revealed a very active use of the medium with more experience.

Between the Government and the Press: The Role of Western Correspondents and Government Public Relations in Reporting on the Middle East • Mohammed el-Nawawy, West Florida and James D. Kelly, Southern Illinois • Western news correspondents and three Egyptian and Israeli government PR officers were interviewed in 1998 to determine their role perceptions within the context of two theoretical models. Correspondents said analysis of complex issues was their primary role and PR officials said theirs was provision of information to correspondents. Israeli officials were far more accessible and easier to work with than their Egyptian counterparts, but correspondents were more skeptical of Israeli information. The newsmaking model best described the relationship.

Government, Press and Advertising Revenue: Impact of the 27 October, 1987 Suspension of The Star’s License to Publish on The Star and the Competing New Straits Times • Tee-Tuan Foo, Ohio • This study seeks to understand the relationship among an authoritarian government, the newspapers and the advertisers. It content analyzed the advertising that appeared in two Malaysian leading English Newspapers, The Star and the New Straits Times, before and after The Star was temporarily suspended by the government on 27 October, 1987. The results found that the Malaysian government’s suspension of The Star’s publishing license decreased the newspaper revenue and increased those of its main competitor, the New Straits Times, following The Star’s return to publication.

The Transitional Press Concept And English-Language Newspaper Readership In The Post-Communist Czech Republic • Bruce Garrison, Miami • Hachten has identified five political concepts of the world press, including the Western free press model. Ognianova has defined a “transitional press concept” for news organizations in nations that had been under Communist Party control and the newly independent press of Central and Eastern Europe that are moving toward the Western concept. This paper analyzed the role of an English-language newspaper in a region where English is not the dominant language.

Post-Cold War Bulgarian Media: Free and Independent at Last? • Robyn S. Goodman, Alfred • Immediately following the Cold War’s collapse, many Bulgarian journalists suddenly declared the Bulgarian mass media “free.” Ten years later, they now argue that the Bulgarian media are far from achieving an independent, democratic status. This study describes changes in the Bulgarian mass media during the Cold War’s final years through the post-Cold War era to answer the following question: How close are the Bulgarian media to establishing themselves as a free, independent Fourth Estate?

McQuail’s Media Performance Analysis And Post-Communist Broadcast Media: A Case Study Of Broadcasting In Estonia • Max V. Grubb, Southern Illinois • ABSTRACT NOT AVAILABLE.

Prospects And Limitations Of World System Theory For Media Analysis: The Case Of Middle East And North Africa • Shelton A. Gunaratne • This essay points out the potential of applying the world system theory to global communication and media analysis as a “humanocentric” enterprise covering both the present and the past. It attempts to identify the world’s core countries using a weighted index of a country’s size of the economy (GNP) and of the exports. It applies the index to rank order the countries in the Middle East and North Africa region to ascertain the likelihood of a core-periphery structure within the region itself and to test whether media freedom and media penetration follow the pattern of that structure.

Attitudes, Communication Behavior, and Cognition: A Trans-Cultural Test of Grunig’s Situational Communication Theory • Kingsley O. Harbor, Mississippi Valley State • This study tested Situational Communication Theory to ascertain its cross-cultural generalizability. The path model employed here comprised attitudinal, communicative, and motivational variables most of which were predicted by the theory. The systemic relationship so formed explained the intention of Developing World students to or not to return home after their studies in the USA. Study used stratified random sample of 400 Developing World students attending an American university. Phone interview refusal rate was 23%. Data analysis involved regression and path analytical models.

After the Rape: The Elite Newspapers’ Use of Sources in their Coverage of Okinawa, 1995-1998 • Beverly J. Horvit, Winthrop • This paper examines journalists’ use of sources on a noncrisis foreign policy issue • the debate over the U.S. troop presence in Okinawa after a child’s rape. A 1995-1998 content analysis of the New York Times, Washington Post and Los Angeles Times shows journalists relied heavily on official sources. In addition, eight of 10 American sources quoted were administration sources. Furthermore, the type of sources quoted was dependent on from where the reporters were reporting.

The Relevance of Mass Communication Research in a Global Era: Localization Strategies of International Companies Entering India • Geetika Pathania Jain, North Texas • ABSTRACT NOT AVAILABLE.

Television and Perceptions of Values among Korean College Students • Jong G. Kang, Illinois State and Seok Kang, Georgia • This study was designed to determine whether the relationship between culture and individualistic or collectivistic value structure types truly exist within the Korean sample of college students. Using the postulates and methodology of the value structure theory by Schwarts to mass communication, this study also employed value type analysis to investigate how respondents’ cultural background and television viewing habit are associated with their responses to value types. This study found significant correlations among individualist, collectivist, and mixed value types.

Glocalization As a Metatheory for International Communication Research • Marwan M. Kraidy, North Dakota • This paper proposes glocalization as a metatheory for international communication research. First, the theoretical problematic of international communication is introduced and international communication paradigms are reviewed. Second, the implications of the literature on globalization and localization for international communication theory are discussed. Third, the concept of glocalization is explained and proposed as a metatheory for international communication. The paper concludes by proposing a research agenda for international communication guided by the metatheory of glocalization.

Locating Asian Values in Journalism: A Content Analysis of Web Newspapers • Brian L. Massey and Arthur Chang, Singapore • The two major positions in the debate over Asian values in journalism were tested by a content analysis of news stories posted to English-language Web newspapers in 10 Asian nations. The findings offer some support to each position. Asian values do appear in reporting by Asian journalists. But they are neither pan-Asia values nor applied uniformly to all news events. This work could provide a benchmark for future studies of Asian values in journalism.

The Transitional Media System Of Post-Autocratic Nigeria • Anthony A. Olorunnisola, Penn State • This paper reviews the character of Nigeria’s recent transition in order to politically locate its media system. A combination of press concepts provides the heuristic basis for the suggestion of the margin of political freedom as a way to determine the latitude available to a transitional media. Also, the margin of political freedom enabled a prediction of the intrinsic readiness of the Nigerian media to face post-autocratic challenges.

Sovereignty, Alliance and Press-Government Relationship: A Comparative Analysis of Japanese and U. S. Coverage of Okinawa • Mariko Oshiro and Tsan-Kuo Chang, Minnesota • Within a comparative framework, the purpose of this paper is to determine the form and content of news coverage of the Okinawa reversion issue between the United States and Japan from 1969 to 1972. The Okinawa reversion issue was one of the most important and controversial diplomatic problems in post-war U.S.-Japan relations because of the 1951 security arrangement. The general theoretical approach in this study is based on two major factors that have been found to influence the news content: ideological structure in society and press-government relationship.

Korean Environmental Journalists: How They Perceived A New Journalistic Role • Jaeyung Park and Robert A. Logan, Missouri-Columbia • This study examined how Korean environmental journalists conceptually perceived a new journalistic role that they played in covering environmental campaigns launched by the news media since 1992 in South Korea. Despite being inadvertently put in situation to receive an unprecedented role of encouraging civic participation in environmental preservation, Korean environmental journalists showed considerable sophistication of understanding their social role. They were not only able to differentiate the challenging role conceptually but also understand it clearly and quickly.

Reading and Rating the Press: Press Freedom and Fair Reporting in Zambia • Greg Pitts, Southern Methodist • Democracy’s sweep through Sub-Saharan Africa during the l990s signaled multiparty elections, spawned additional media voices, and at least deference to a free press. Zambia is an example of a new democracy dealing these changes. A survey Zambia Parliamentarians found that 89% of respondents read at least one newspaper. However, Parliamentarians give Zambia’s newest privately owned daily newspaper a low score on fair reporting though resource scarcity and socialization of Parliamentarians may contribute to this perception.

The Flow of News About Environmental Risk in Mexico 1983-97 • Donnalyn Pompper, Tallahassee • This textual analysis of environmental risks of Mexico examined hegemony as encoded in two mainstream U.S. daily newspapers, 1983-1997. Five themes emerged upon examination of images, concepts and premises used in newsmaking. Furthermore, texts underscored power relations between the two nations. U.S. government and industry were influential in matters of air, water and land pollution, habitat loss, and industrial safety in Mexico. Mexican policymakers, by omission, were passive.

A Talking Nation, Not a Talking Individual: A New Order in Tanzania? • Jyotika Ramaprasad, Southern Illinois • Using a survey of 141 journalists, this study profiles the Tanzanian journalist in terms of demographic, workplace and attitudinal variables. The Tanzanian journalist’s pursuit of his profession is deliberate and he subscribes to its lofty ideals. He rates accuracy, analysis, investigation, and such high, and places considerable importance on the public affairs role of journalism, more so than on the material benefits of the job. At the same time, the years of socialization under “ujamaa,” the socialist policy of development which enrolled the press as partner, and the political policy of a one-party state have left their trace and are evident even in these more liberal times.

Factors Affecting the Internet Adoption by Thai Journalists: A Diffusion of Innovation Study • Anucha Thirakanont and Thomas Johnson, Southern Illinois • This research was designed to examine what factors affect the adoption of the Internet by newspaper journalists in Thailand. The diffusion of innovation (Rogers, 1995) was used as a primary theoretical framework for the study with English language introduced as an additional variable. The results indicated that the perceived attributes of innovation • relative advantage, compatibility, complexity, trialability, and observability • were useful predictors of the adoption. The additional attribute • English-language compatibility of the Internet • did not turn out to be a significant predictor of adoption because likely-adopters and nonadopters did not appear to be aware of the problem.

The Pacific War: A Retrospective Look at Anti-Japanese Propaganda In The New York Times and Anti-American Propaganda in Asahi Shimbun • Hideko Yoshimoto and Diana Stover Tillinghast, San Jose State • The study, which examines anti-Japanese propaganda in The New York Times and anti-American propaganda in Asahi Shimbun during the Pacific War, found that the propaganda in the Times was a mirror image of the propaganda in Asahi in the time periods from the bombing of Pearl Harbor until Japan’s surrender. This finding held for both newspapers across all five thematic categories of propaganda • authoritarianism, patriotic appeal, self-image, enemy image, and morale manipulation.

Changing Relationships Between The Press And The State: A Sociopolitical And Communication Law Perspective • Kyu Ho Youm, Arizona State • The far-reaching evolution of the statutory framework on the freedom and control of the Korean press since 1987 is a fascinating case study. While there is still a legacy of suppression in some press statutes in Korea, other statutes make press freedom become closer to a reality for Koreans. The press statutes in and of themselves, however, cannot be an accurate indication of how the Korean press exercises its freedom with or without constraint.

Markham Competition
News Media Representation of the Yanomami Indians as a Reflection of the Ideal Audience • Tania H. Cantrell, Brigham Young • Using Narrative Paradigm Theory and Narrative Analysis, this study investigates news media coverage of the Yanomami Indians, an indigenous tribe residing in northern Brazil and Venezuela. Eight themes are described and plausible interpretations of ideal audience member values are presented. This project explores the reflective nature of the news media, discusses insights into the question of human identity, and concludes recommending further study to assess how the Yanomami would tell their own story.

Support of the Film Industries in France and Italy in the late l990s • Joseph Denny, Indiana • France and Italy each possess a proud film history. Both have made significant efforts to bolster their film industries for most of the 20th century. The results have been mixed. This paper examines and compares the efforts of France and Italy to maintain their film industries in the second half of the 1990s. It also offers policy recommendations for the future.

New Portraits in Old Frams: US and Chinese Media Utterances on the 50th Anniversary of the Founding of the People’s Republic of China • Yun Ding, Minnesota • This article seeks to delineate prominent media frames in the brief but intense reportage of the 50th anniversary of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) by major U.S. and Chinese press. In a renewed attempt to unravel the China Knot, the U.S. media evinced a strong anti-Communist sentiment, whereas the Chinese press, under direct ideological dictate and institutional control, continued to betray its entrenched style of sing-along journalism. Taken together, they afforded us an opportunity to examine how competing discursive communities handled the heavy topic of Communism on the eve of a new century.

We Are French Too, But Different: Radio, Music and The Articulation of difference among Young North Africans In France • Nabil Echchaibi, Indiana • Research on migrants in media studies has focused mainly on representation in and reception of the mainstream media of the host country. While such research is still valuable, it obscures the role of migrants as active participants and producers of alternative media outlets that help in the articulation of their diasporic experience. This essay discusses how, through radio and music, young North Africans in France negotiate, elaborate, and reappropriate different cultural forms to carve out a place for themselves in French culture.

Manufacturing Consent of ‘Crisis’: A Content Analysis of the New York Times’ Reporting on the Issue of North Korean Nuclear Weapon • Oh-Hyeon Lee, Massachusetts • ABSTRACT NOT AVAILABLE.

Communicative Distance and Media Stereotyping in an International Context • Deepak Prem Subramony, Minnesota • This paper transfers the constructs of communicative distance and stereotyping commonly found in the interpersonal communication literature into an international communication context. It hypothesizes that stereotyping by the media of one nation, of news from another nation, is positively correlated with the communicative distance between the two nations. Using innovative operationalizations of the communicative distance and media stereotyping constructs, the paper presents six international content analyses in support of the above hypothesis.

Historicizing Japanese Television Dramas: Technology, Drama Workers, and the Rise and Fall of Social Drama, 1945-1960 • Eva Tsai, Iowa • ABSTRACT NOT AVAILABLE.

The European Press And The Euro: Media Agenda-Setting In A Cross-National Environment • Olaf Werder, Gainesville • Coverage of the Euro currency introduction was analyzed in the leading news publications in the UK and Germany. Specifically, we probed whether (l) coverage of the same cross-national issue differed in level of support and (2) the two national media applied different news frames. The study showed that the London Times opposed the Euro even with pro-Euro sources, whereas the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung maintained neutrality. The Times used an episodic, while the F.A.Z. employed a thematic style.

<< 2000 Abstracts

History 2000 Abstracts

History Division

Collusion and Price Fixing in the American Newspaper Industry, 1890-1910: A National Trend • Ed Adams, Brigham Young • This study cites examples of price fixing and collusive practices used among newspapers in several cities across the United States during the late 1890s and early 1900s. An examination of the E.W. Scripps papers reveals secret agreements or “combinations” that were utilized between competitors to gain market advantages or to limit competition. These practices were used to limit or eliminate competition. The practices included, but were not limited to profit pooling, price fixing, collusion and contract exclusivity.

The Birth of the Demise of Valentine Decision: Development of the Supreme Court’s Opinion Toward Commercial Speech • Soontae An, North Carolina • This study traces the development of the Supreme Court’s opinion toward commercial speech from 1942 to 1976. Early cases demonstrated that the Court’s uncertainty on what made certain speech commercial led to subsequent difficulties in deciding the boundary of the First Amendment protection for other categories of speech when they entailed commercial features in their messages. From his first remark in 1959, Justice Douglas consistently argued the deficiencies in the Valentine decision and urged the Court to set a more appropriate standard for the commercial speech.

Selling the National Pastime: The Formation of Major League Baseball Public Relations • Bill Anderson, Georgia • Understanding how one industry used publicity in the nineteenth century generated insights into how the field as a whole was utilized. In the case of the National League of Professional Base Ball Clubs owners, they learned that maintaining the top player talent ensured favorable newspaper coverage. To maintain sympathetic media coverage while fighting to maintain the top player talent, the owners started their own publications, and bribed reporters to present their side of the industry.

The U.S. Military and War Correspondents in World War II: Roles and Relationships • Alan Armitage, Southern Illinois-Edwardsville • The relationship between the U.S. military and war correspondents during World War II affected coverage of the war as much as the rules of censorship. Colin Sparks’ six roles which the state plays in relation to the media (patron, censor, actor, masseur, ideologue, and conspirator) are the basis for an examination of works by and about World War II war correspondents to explore the impact of the relationship on coverage of the war.

“A Society Without A Newspaper is Like a Body Without a Head”: Chicago’s Immigrant Workers And Their Press • Jon Bekken, Suffolk • At the turn of the century, Chicago’s immigrant working class developed dense networks of community institutions, bound together by weekly and daily newspapers which were integral parts of those communities. This paper briefly examines the Lithuanian, Italian and Croatian immigrant press, examining the ways in which these newspapers helped give shape to developing communities and to define and make their place in the world around them.

“American Press Coverage of Sociologist Herbert Spencer During His 1882 Visit to America” • Jack Breslin, Minnesota • Herbert Spencer, the English philosopher and social scientist of evolution, enjoyed remarkable popularity in post-bellum America. This paper describes the newspaper coverage of Spencer’s 1882 visit to America in an attempt to discern what views of Spencer’s were conveyed to readers which shaped how they perceived him. Through content analysis of relevant news stories, feature stories, dispatches and editorials in nine selected major newspapers, this study of press coverage of Spencer’s visit offers an insight into this country’s acceptance or rejection of his intellectual contribution.

First Use: The Emergence and Diffusion of “Yellow Journalism” • W. Joseph Campbell, American University • This paper seeks to resolve a matter of enduring dispute among media historians by presenting specific and compelling evidence about the date and context of the earliest published use of the term “yellow journalism”: It appeared first in Ervin Wardman’s New York Press in January 1897. Wardman, before seizing upon “yellow journalism,” had experimented with at least one other phrase – “nude journalism” – as a substitute for “new journalism,” which then was commonly associated with the newspapers of Hearst and Pulitzer.

The (S.C.) Palmetto Leader: A Successful Start, 1925-1927 • Kenneth Campbell, South Carolina • The Palmetto Leader was a vibrant (but now little known) black weekly that got off to a successful start in 1925 because it catered to the emerging black middle class in South Carolina, particularly in Columbia. This research addresses the factors that made the weekly successful, both those traditional factors and others that might set The Leader apart.

William G. Brownlow and the Knoxville Whig: A career of Personal Journalism or Partisan Press • Alisa White Coleman, Texas-Arlington • An example of personal journalism was The Knoxville Whig, edited by William Gannoway Brownlow, Tennessee’s first Reconstruction governor. Brownlow used his newspaper as a tool for the Whig party, his own religious beliefs, and to further the interests of himself and his friends. This paper takes a historiographical approach to examine Brownlow’s editorial stand on the issues concentrating on the period from 1849, when he moved to Knoxville, to 1865, when he was elected governor.

Yosemite’s Transition from Space to Place: An Historical Investigation into Media’s Role in the Place-Making Process • Nickieann Fleener and Edward Ruddell, Utah • In the early 1850s very few individuals knew that the area which now constitutes part of Yosemite National Park existed. Yet the area’s obscurity was short lived and by 1864 Yosemite was protected by federal mandate. Cultural geographers refer to this transition from space to place and acknowledge the integral part media play in the place-making process.

Chicago Newspaper Theater Critics of the Early 20th Century: Mediating Ibsen, the Syndicate and the Little Theaters • Scott Fosdick, Missouri • This paper responds to the near total lack of scholarship on the Chicago newspaper theater critics of the period 1900 to 1920 by offering a preliminary look at who these critics were and how they responded to three challenges they faced: the controversial new “problem plays” of such European playwrights as Ibsen and Shaw, the expansionist tendencies of the New York theatrical Syndicate, and the Little Theater movement.

The National Geographic Magazine and Environmental Coverage, 1970-1980 • Jan Knight, Ohio • In 1970, National Geographic began covering environmental pollution, an editorial shift away from its eighty-two-year-old policy of avoiding controversy. Through a review of the magazine’s history from 1888 to 1980, editor’s letters to readers, and interviews with staff members, this paper reveals that the magazine’s environmental coverage focused largely on threats to U. S. energy sources and was tempered by fears that disgruntled, but powerful, readers would challenge the National Geographic Society’s nonprofit status.

The Creation of the “Free” Press in Japanese American Internment Camps: The War Relocation Authority’s Planning and Making of the Camp Newspaper Policy • Takeya Mizuno, Missouri • This study investigates how the War Relocation Authority (WRA) planned and documented the newspaper publishing policy in Japanese American internment camps during World War II. The WRA allowed internees to publish their own newspapers “freely” without “censorship” but under the authority’s “supervision.” This study examines the process and content of the WRA’s camp press policy. This study also shows that the federal government’s propaganda tactics had much to do with the WRA’s “free under supervision” scheme of press control.

The Klan and Press in Atlanta, 1919-1921: A Tale of Public Relations and Newspaper Opposition • Hanna Norton and Karen Miller, Georgia • This paper analyzes press coverage of the Klan in three Atlanta newspapers before, during and after its Imperial Wizard hired a public relations firm in June 1920. Scholars have not reached a consensus on the national press’s importance to the rise or destruction of the Klan. They have, however, most often condemned the press for not undertaking active opposition to the Klan. Our own research found that all three Atlanta daily newspapers did comment negatively on the organization during the two week period surrounding the 1921 Congressional investigation.

Race and the Construction of News: Press Coverage of the Tuskegee Study, 1972 • April L. Peterson, Washington • On 26 July 1972, Associated Press reporter Jean Heller broke the story of a 40 year-old Public Health Service study of syphilis in a population of African American men in Macon County, Alabama. This paper reviews news coverage of that story as a case study of race and the construction of news by examining news stories in the mainstream press and black press of the period. News frames are discussed to illuminate how news is constructed.

Czars, Presidents, Philosophers, and Miscegenation: The Cultural Power of Early Motion Pictures • Elaine Walls Reed, Kutztown University-Pennsylvania • From the vantage point of time, aided by access to the personal documents of movie czar Will H. Hays and philosopher Mortimer J. Adler, motion picture historians and critics learn more about the public and private negotiations that helped to shape 20th century American race relations.

The Confederate Press Association: A Revolutionary Experience in Southern Journalism? • Ford Risley, Penn State • This study examines the guidelines for telegraphic reporting established by the Confederate Press Association during the Civil War. The association’s superintendent liked to say the practices, which stressed concise, timely, and factual news reporting, represented a “complete revolution” in Southern journalism. Indeed, they were a major change in a region where timely news reporting traditionally had taken a backseat to editorial opinion. Although the work of the association was not the revolutionary experience claimed, the standards it sought to live up to clearly raised the bar for Southern journalism.

Crisis Public Relations at Pennzoil: An Organization’s Corporate Communication Response During a Landmark Legal Battle • Dennis R. Robertson, Arkansas State University • Pennzoil’s battle with Texaco in the 1980s over the Getty Oil reserves was legendary legal history. It was also public relations history. This paper examines the role of public relations in the Pennzoil-Texaco battle. Through literature review, personal interviews and oral histories, the research documents the policies, practices, and tactics of Pennzoil’s public relations department during one of the most fascinating events in American corporate history.

“Pounding Brass” for the Associated Press: A Surviving Press Telegrapher Recalls His Craft • J. Steven Smethers, Oklahoma State • Before the widespread adoption of the teletype, the Associated Press employed telegraph operators to dispatch news copy to member newspapers. This paper chronicles the heyday of press telegraphy through the reminiscences of a former AP telegrapher, Aubrey E. Keel of Kansas City, covering various aspects of this lost profession, including the training, daily routines, professional standards and the eventual displacement caused by the industry’s conversion to teletype technology.

Bat Masterson: Sheriff of the Sports Page • Mike Sowell, Oklahoma State • Bat Masterson not only was one of the last heroes of the Old West in the late nineteenth century but also one of the first heroes of a new frontier at the turn of the century the sports page of the American newspaper. This paper is an examination of how Masterson’s sports columns from 1903 to 1921 reflected his self-appointed role as a de facto “sheriff of boxing,” and how he used his forum as a sports writer to apply his Western sense of honor and justice to the boxing ring.

Science, Journalism and the Construction of News: How Print Media Framed the 1918 Influenza Pandemic • Meg Spratt, Washington • This paper examines how the relationship between scientific method and journalistic norms shaped news frames of the 20th Century’s most deadly pandemic in both scientific and mainstream publications. By examining journalistic coverage in Science, Scientific American, Survey, and The New York Times of the Spanish Influenza at the height of the 1918 pandemic, it becomes apparent that reliance upon objectivity, neutrality, and empirical data supported the views of authoritative sources while almost obliterating the voices of victims and average citizens.

Liberal Journalism in the Deep South: Harry M. Ayers And The “Bothersome” Race Question • Kevin Stocker, Brigham Young • This paper looks at why Anniston (Alabama) Star editor Colonel Harry Ayers progressed then retrogressed on the race issue. He befriended blacks in the 1920s and advocated economic, educational, and electoral equality in the 1930s and 1940s but opposed integration. A study of his writings provides a unique look at a member of an ignored group of southern community newspaper editors who tried to build a New South without harming the old one.

Strange Bedfellows, or a Marriage Made in Heaven? Advertising, the Federal Government, and the Second World War • Inger Stole, Illinois • Contending that the Second World War helped solidify the institution of advertising in the economy, the polity, and American culture, this paper chronicles how the American advertising industry navigated the treacherous political waters of Washington D.C. in the early 1940s, primarily through its newly created public relations arm, the (War) Advertising Council. It argues that the Council successfully neutralized the threat of hostile government actions towards advertising, and helped establish cordial relations between the federal government and the advertising industry.

Expanding the “Dual Role” Concept: The Latvian Newspaper Kanadietis, 1913-1914 • Andris Straumanis, Wisconsin-Eau Claire • Adopting the work of anthropologists who have studied “rites of passage,” this paper suggests that the long-standing debate about the role of the immigrant press should be reexamined by stressing the liminal stage. Expanding the notion of a “dual role” allows for inclusion of media that do not fit the traditional dichotomy of cultural maintenance vs. acculturation. The Latvian-language newspaper Kanadietis, published in Winnipeg, Canada, from 1913 to 1914, is presented as a case study.

Covering the Century: How Four New York Dailies Reported the End of the 19th Century • Randall Scott Sumpter, Texas A&M • This study compares how two groups of New York dailies covered the end of the l9th century. The “yellow” press linked the century’s end to jingoistic predictions, self-promoting scoops and coverage of sensational topics. Other editors, seeking reader and advertiser niches not yet dominated by the yellow journals, avoided sensation and tempered optimistic predictions with stories about possible shortages. Their efforts furnish another example of how market competition nourished the development of “objective” news practices.

New York City Press and the McKinley Assassination: Debates About Journalism Ethics When a Newspaper Was Accused of Killing a President • Brian Thornton, Northern Illinois • William Randolph Hearst’s New York Journal was accused of inciting a presidential assassination following the shooting death of President William McKinley in September 1901. At that point the Journal and a rival, The New York Sun, promptly engaged in a letters to the editor war. This paper examines public reaction and debates about journalistic responsibility published in five leading New York City daily newspapers -The New York Journal; The Evening Post; The New York Sun; The New York Times; and The New York World.

Burning Crosses and Activist Journalism: The Unlikely Heroism of Two Mississippi Editors • Jan Whitt, Colorado • Journalists summarize lifetimes and abbreviate events in order to serve the interests of public knowledge and/or social action. It is tempting for them to write the stories of everyday citizens as if their subjects are somehow more courageous, more spiritual, or more committed than the average person. Telling the stories of “heroes” • such as Pulitzer Prize-winning Mississippi journalists Ira B. Harkey Jr. and Hazel Brannon Smith • requires an understanding of the nature of both journalistic and historical narrative.

World War I and the Success of the United Press • Dale Zacher, North • This study uses extensive original source documents to examine the importance World War One played in the eventual financial success of the United Press wire service. The U.P., created in 1907, faced a difficult task in covering a global war, yet emerged from it stronger than ever. The U.P. was able to use several notable scoops early in the war to establish a long-lasting reputation, overcoming problems with censorship, technological limitations and cutthroat competition.

<< 2000 Abstracts

Cultural and Critical Studies 2000 Abstracts

Cultural and Critical Studies Division

This Mythical Place, El Pais de Las Mujeres: Representing Women in a Venezuelan Telenova • Carolina Acosta-Alzuru, Georgia • Latin American telenovelas stand out as a genre that has successfully challenged its U.S. counterpart — the soap opera — in a global media environment that is increasingly dominated by the U.S. Drawing on cultural studies, this report focuses on how women are represented in a Venezuelan telenovela, El Pais de las Mujeres (The Country of the Women). These representations are negative in themselves. However, the storylines reverse these negative constructions by ridiculing them (and the characters that voice them), providing, in this way, a vehicle of empowerment for Venezuelan women.

The First Amendment and the Doctrine of Corporate Personhood: Collapsing the Press-Corporation Distinction • David S. Allen, Illinois State • This paper examines the legal concept of corporate personhood, entitling corporations to protection under the Fourteenth Amendment and the Bill of Rights, as it applies to the press. Following that doctrine, the U.S. Supreme Court has struggled to differentiate the press from corporations, collapsing First Amendment distinctions. It is suggested that the Court’s actions hurt press freedom, but more importantly creates another opening for corporate domination of the public sphere.

Reconstructing the Concept of Public Trusteeship in the Digital Broadcasting Era: Public Trusteeship for a Deliberative Democracy • Misook Baek, Iowa • This paper attempts to construct the political-philosophical foundation of public trusteeship to realize the democratic potential of digital broadcasting, shifting away from the narrow debate of regulatory scheme and policy. Thus, this paper proposes the conceptualization of public trusteeship for a deliberative democracy emphasizing an informed citizen and civic participation in political processes. This paper relies on Dewey’s and Habermas’ theoretical discussion of the media, the community, and democracy, and the communitarian interpretation of the First Amendment.

Telemedicine in South Dakota: A Cultural Studies Approach • Warren Bareiss, South Dakota State • This study examines how socio-economic relationships are negotiated with regard to telemedicine in South Dakota — a state where telemedicine has rapidly developed in response to an ongoing crisis in health-care. An overview of economic conditions in South Dakota is followed by examinations of network structures through which telemedicine operates and an analysis of how telemedicine is rhetorically constructed. Concluding sections discuss the hegemonic nature of telemedicine in South Dakota and raise new questions about telemedicine.

Marginalized, Excluded and Invisible: The Portrayal of Labor in Journalism Textbooks • Jon Bekken • Journalism textbooks play a key role in not only training journalists in their craft, but also in inculcating professional ideology. This study examines 29 newswriting, media writing, and reporting textbooks, documenting their systematic marginalization and exclusion of labor. Even texts that address the need for labor coverage often undercut that message through examples and assignments, which rely exclusively upon management and government sources. This “hidden curriculum” simultaneously undercuts the textbooks’ stated intentions, and ideologically prepares journalists to serve as stenographers to power.

Cyberspace: The New Disney Universe • Jeffrey Layne Blevins • The Disney empire comprises one of the top media conglomerates in the world and their most notable move in Cyberspace has been the addition of an Internet search engine. The purpose of this study is to explore Disney’s expansion into Cyberspace and analyze the relationship between its Internet search engine and burgeoning media empire. This newest search engine will most likely power an effective vehicle for Disney to cross-promote its vast empire.

What’s Wrong with a Little Media Manipulation, Anyway?: Longing for Althusser • Bonnie Brennen, Missouri-Columbia • This convention paper focuses on the current one billion dollar anti-drug public service announcement deal, through which the United States government has been inserting propaganda into prime time television shows. It draws on the work of French philosopher Louis Althusser, specifically his contributions to the development of ideology, in an attempt to illustrate the continued relevance of his work to understanding the complex relationship between media and society.

A Tradition of Dissent: West Indians and Liberian Journalism, 1830 to 1970 • Carl Patrick Burrowes, Howard • West Indians immigrants were conspicuously present in the Liberian press, especially in forms of journalism that challenged the hegemonic order established by African-American repatriates. Notably among them were John B. Russwurm, founder of the first Black newspaper in America, and Edward Wilmot Blyden, a leading nineteenth-century Black intellectual. Their ideological challenges consistently evidenced a duality that is said to characterize Caribbean culture: a social conservatism coupled with a political radicalism.

Between Cultural and Social Identities: A Discourse Analysis of Web Diaries on Hong Kong’s Handover • Hong Cheng and Guofang Wan, Bradley • This paper is a discourse analysis of Web diaries concerning Hong Kong’s handover from Britain to China. It pinpointed numerous dynamic and multifaceted interactions of language, culture, and ideology in Hong Kong people’s heart and soul searches for cultural and social identities during the territory’s sovereignty transfer. The paper also examined communication strategies used in Web diaries and analyzed this new communication genre’s potential for empowering mass audience as well as enlarging knowledge gap.

What Language Do Cyborgs Speak? • Mia Consalvo, Wisconsin-Milwaukee • This paper explores fan communication online, and how online communication in general is changing. This is due to two factors — the development of hypertext, and our vision of ourselves as cyborgs. I argue that hypertext changes the way we think about knowledge, it de-centers authority, and challenges the linear. As we move online, and learn how to exploit this new “language” we will develop new and revolutionary uses for it. However, we must use this new language and way of being to ensure that everyone has access to it, for it to be truly revolutionary.

The Reality of Virtual Hate: A Fantasy Theme Analysis of the Rhetorical Vision of Hate Groups Online • Margaret E. Duffy and Victoria A. Palmer, Austin Peay State University • The development and growth of the Internet and Worldwide Web have provided a new and persuasive medium for business, education, and social interaction. It has also provided a powerful new medium for hate groups seeking to disseminate their message and recruit new followers. This paper uses Ernest Bormann’s fantasy theme analysis to examine hate group websites as a means to understand the worldviews expressed and the resulting potential for persuasion.

Janet Malcolm: Constructing a Journalist’s Identity • Elizabeth Fakazis, Indiana • This article explores the role that Janet Malcolm played in defining the boundaries of legitimate journalism as she defended herself against charges that her journalistic methods and her identity as a professional journalist were suspect. Malcolm positioned herself as a journalist and metajournalist, defining her methods as representing the norms of the profession while challenging the dominant conception of journalism as an enterprise ideally involving disinterested, institutional voices rather than individual authors subjectively interacting with their subjects and texts.

Negotiating Consumption, Play and Masculinities through Role-Play/Trading Cards Games: An Exploratory Research on the Players of Magic: The Gathering¨ in Iowa City • Mirerza Gonzalez-Velez, Iowa • In an attempt to understand the relationship between the construction of cultural identities and the consumer culture, this paper explores role-play/trading cards games such as Magic: The Gathering¨. Using as evidence data of an exploratory qualitative research developed with non-participant observation and semi-informal interviews, the paper argues that games as Magic: The Gathering¨ represents both a commodity of the culture industry and a cultural space in which male identity is constructed.

The News of Inclusive Education: A Narrative Analysis • Beth A. Haller, Towson and Bruce Dorries, Radford • This paper investigates a nationally publicized case in the debate over the best method of educating millions of children with severe disabilities. Using Fisher’s narrative paradigm, this paper analyzes four years of the extensive media coverage of the legal battles of Mark Hartmann’s family. The 11-year-old’s parents took the Loudoun County, Va., Board of Education to court to reinstate their autistic son in a regular classroom. Much media attention focused on the story because it dramatized the issues concerning the national debate about inclusion.

The “Forgotten” 1918 Influenza Epidemic and Press Portrayal of Public Anxiety • Janice Hume, Kansas State • Journalists and scholars often use the idea of a shared “American anxiety” in their analyses of trends, yet no one has looked historically at how media depict public anxiety. This study examines magazine coverage of a domestic crisis that should have made Americans anxious, the 1918 influenza epidemic, to explore references to anxiety, and to try to understand why this epidemic, which killed more people than World War 1, is lost to American public memory.

Theorizing Automotive Radio: Prosthesis, Technology, and Cultural Form • Matthew A. Killmeier, Iowa • Automotive radio and broadcasting emerged in the 1950s as a unique cultural form of radio, rather than a particular manifestation of radio. As a mobile medium, it required a mobile society, audiences and content. This paper is a theoretical engagement with the meanings and significances of automotive radio, including mobility, space and over place, technology and information.

‘Grimm’ News Indeed: ‘Madstones,’ Clever Toads, and Killer Tarantulas (Fairy-Tale Briefs in Wild West Newspapers) • Paulette D. Kilmer, Toledo • Editors in Nevada, Texas, Arizona, or California sprinkled fanciful items among editorials boosting their new El Dorado and sober news accounts. Besides connecting East and West via the imagination, these fairy-tale briefs provided a respite from the harsh reality reported graphically in the news columns and too often experienced personally by readers in frontier communities during the late Nineteenth Century.

The Active Audience in a Panic: A Case Study of the Interaction between Media Discourse and Public Opinion prior to Labor Law Revision in December 1996, Korea • Nam-Doo Kim, Texas at Austin • This paper examines the interaction between mainstream media discourse and public opinion before labor law revision in 1996, Korea, and evaluates the nature of the public through the redefinition of “active audience.” While the media coverage of labor issue and background issue was unbalanced toward pro-employer side, there were some indicators that the public responded sensitively to the marginalized oppositional theme in the media discourse. The activeness in the general audience was motivated by the mass fear.

Examining the Problematic of Auteur Theory: The Case of David E. Kelley and Picket Fences • Karen E. Kline, Lock Haven University of Pennsylvania • This paper explores the contemporary critique of auteur theory in the realm of commercial television production, which has been asserted, from poststructuralist, materialist, and dialogic perspectives. Drawing upon ethnographic research conducted within the David E. Kelley production company, the author argues that Kelley is a television auteur, albeit one whose authorship is implemented in ways consistent with the auteurist critique. Thus, this paper offers a variegated view of television authorship, which incorporates that critique.

Polysemy, Resistance, and Hegemony: An Audience Research of a Korean Prime-Time Drama • Oh-Hyeon Lee, Massachusetts • While exploring the polysemic nature of a Korean prime-time drama, Bogo Ddo Bogo, and its viewers’ interpretations, this paper examines the hegemonic power of the show, the agency of the audience, and the power relations between them. This study finds that the viewers actively construct various meanings of the program, even resistant to the dominant ideological meanings and values articulated in the program. However, the hegemonic power of the program seems to overpower the agency of the audience.

Capote’s Legacy: The Challenge of Creativity and Credibility in Literary Journalism • Mark H. Masse, Ball State • Thirty-five years ago (1965), Truman Capote published his best-selling “nonfiction novel,” In Cold Blood. The book has been both praised for its compelling writing and criticized for its inaccurate and misleading reporting. The legacy of Capote reflects the enduring challenge facing authors of literary journalism in producing creative and credible works. This paper examines Capote’s historical contributions to the craft of narrative nonfiction writing and the critical response to In Cold Blood since the 1960s.

Rosa Luxemborg, The Thomas Paine of the Russian Revolution: A Pamphleteer, a Martyr and a Socialist with a Human Face • Beverly G. Merrick, New Mexico State • The purpose of this research into intellectual history is to explore the contributions of Rosa Luxemborg, as pamphleteer and political columnist. She predicted the fall of the Leninist-Marxist model, and proposed a kind of social democratic model that is a cousin to similar political and social movements in the United States. Although she became a martyr for her contributions to the thenradical thought of freedom of expression in Soviet Russia, more than 40 years before the sixties movement of the New Left, Luxemborg is the ideological founder of that movement.

The Symbolic Repertoires of Contention: The Rhetoric of California Latino Strikers and Media Framing • Young Min, Texas at Austin • The present paper explores the collective action frames of a Latino labor strike in California and probes the media’s framing of the walkout. By employing various polarizing frames and religious rhetorical markers, the strikers try to mobilize various audiences as supporters and invalidate the management’s new labor policies, but do not radically challenge capitalist law and order. Being dissonant with the strikers’ collective action frames, the news frames color the strike as a matter of conflicts between strikers and replacement workers and posit the company’s neo-liberal labor policies as reasonable business decisions.

Ideology and Manufactured Environments: An Analysis of the Disney Home Page • Randy Nichols, Oregon • This paper provides a critical analysis of the way in which the Disney web page is set up to enforce Disney’s ideological stance. By drawing on political economic studies of the Disney corporation as well as studies of how the Disney corporation controls space for its ideological ends, a better understanding of the implications of the company’s web page is gained.

Hemp in the Media: Social Struggles over a Controversial Plant • Andy Opel, North Carolina-Chapel Hill • This paper examines the recent effort to revitalize the hemp industry in the United States. Contrasting information from the hemp advocates websites and popular literature with newspaper coverage from three major dailies over a three-year period, this discourse analysis reveals a struggle over the definition of the hemp plant. The media discourse around hemp in the late 1990s is found to be more than a semantic debate, and includes connections to the larger cultural debates of the “drug war” and the “culture war.”

Discourse about Global Media in Postcolonial India: Beauty Contests, Gender, and Nationalism • Radhika E. Parameswaran, Indiana • The controversial Miss World beauty contest that was held in India in 1996 is the focus of the proposed project. The controversy arose from protests expressed against the pageant by factions such as religious leaders, political parties, and feminist activists. This study is based on intensive interviews with organizers and sponsors of the pageant, and with other informants who were involved in managing and supporting the pageant.

The Talk of Movers and Shakers: Class Conflict in the Making of a Community Disaster • Lana F. Rakow, North Dakota • Communities and disasters are both products of communication. Communities are created by interactions of residents and institutions; disasters are named and blame assigned. In 1997, Grand Forks, North Dakota experienced a serious flood, which altered communication processes and highlighted class conflicts. Two groups, “movers” and “shakers,” represent conflicts over definitions of the event, political ideologies, and control of material and symbolic activity. While both groups “talk,” only one has “voice,” further embedding class differences.

Myth of the Southern Box Office: Lining Domestic Coffers with Global Prejudices • Elaine Walls Reed, Kutztown University of Pennsylvania • In the first half of the 20th century, the foreign market for domestic motion pictures dictated screen content that helped to institutionalize a domestic version of British imperialism. The Southern box office became the scapegoat, and American race relations suffered because of it.

Veiled Promise: The Meaning of “Chador” as a Late 20th Century Signifler • Elizabeth Lester Roushanzamir, Georgia • This inquiry investigates U.S. media texts demonstrating how processes of articulation and negotiation help construct a strategic version of Iran, which promotes the goals of transnational capital and U.S. foreign policy. While at times the goals of capital and state diverge, the construction of a gendered Other complements media representations of ethnicity, “race,” nationality and class to further common goals. In particular, representations of Iranian women in the news media, flat simplistic, iconic and memorable form a discourse of power that differs significantly from 19th century Orientalist representations.

Chiapas and the New News: Internet and Newspaper Coverage of a Broken Cease-fire • Adrienne Russell, Indiana • Taking the norms of journalism as exhibited in newspaper coverage of the Zapatista uprising in Chiapas as its starting point, this study analyzes online discourse centered around the rebel movement in order to reveal characteristics unique to computer mediated discourse. The paper focuses on the mechanisms by which traditional journalism and computer mediated communication each produces a particular truth about the Zapatista movement.

One of Those Shows: What Ally McBeal Tells Us about the Fate of Feminism • Camisha Ann Russell, American • Ally McBeal is a popular and fiercely debated show. The Ally character is simultaneously seen as feminist, postfeminist, and anti-feminist. The show was even used in Time magazine to ask: “Is Feminism Dead?” Such a question rests heavily on particular interpretations of the show and of feminism itself. Ally McBeal and the discussion surrounding it have more to tell us about the way our society views feminism than about feminism’s actual condition in that society.

Sunny Days on Sesame Street?: Multiculturalism and Resistance Postmodernism • Ute Sartorius, South Dakota • After thirty years of broadcasting, Sesame Street, which has been called one of the most influential children’s shows ever, plays an important role in shaping society’s construction of multiculturalism. This paper addresses the role of educational children’s television as a contributor to the forging of the notion of multiculturalism by analyzing Sesame Street’s suitability as an instrument for multicultural pedagogy.

Return of the Mummy: Hollywood Horror Revives Orientalism • Soon-Chul Shin, Georgia • Edward Said’s Orientalism explains how historical narrative have framed and distorted the images of the “Other.” The spectators are led to an exotic place, while watching Orientalistic films, where historical, spatial, temporal, and cultural contexts are totally fictitious, not just distorted; Imperialistic narrative rather “refract” the Others instead of “reflect” them. Tales of “the other” narrated by Orientalistic discourse boosted exploration of cinema’s particular capacity to reproduce an object in “verisimilitude” without truth.

Contradictory by Nature: The Dream of Attaining Nirvana through Materialism: A Critical Analysis of Silicon Valley Internet Start-ups and Entrepreneurs • Helga G. Tawil, Colorado • This is a preliminary research project based on in-depth interviews with individuals at Silicon Valley start-ups. From the Critical Theory approach, the aim is understanding and analyzing the forces in, and reasons for joining start-ups; attempting to understand the struggle and reconciliation between individuality and social pressures, looking at how the individual preserves his autonomy and individuality in the face of overwhelming social forces in Silicon Valley start-up culture, as well as addressing those socio-economic forces.

Dubuque’s First Political Prisoner: Violence, Class, and the ‘Frameup’ of Labor Journalist Archie Carter • James F. Tracy, Iowa • This paper is an analysis of the circumstances preceding and following the arrest and conviction of labor journalist, organizer, and political activist Archie Carter on a sodomy charge in Dubuque, Iowa, in 1938. Examination of newspapers, oral histories, court documents, and personal materials of Carter’s associates indicates that Carter was framed by powerful business interests and state authorities because of his activities as labor organizer and journalist.

Presidential Politics, the Emergence of Entertainment Journalism, and the Battle for Headlines: An Examination of the 1994-1995 Baseball Strike • Robert Trumpbour, Pennsylvania State • The capacity to inject ideology into sports-related content is explored, utilizing Presidential involvement with the 1994-1995 Major League Baseball strike. It is argued that entertainment-based media content may be perceived as culturally neutral by some citizens, but several media-related trends may serve to intensify the influence of these messages. President Clinton’s participation in the 1994-1995 baseball strike appeared to be a policy failure, but upon closer inspection, several successes were achieved.

Locating a Theoretical and Methodological Field for Contemporary Japanese TV Dramas: Discourse Hierarchy, Critical Ethnography and Radical Space of Television Writers • Eva Tsai, Iowa • This essay critiques various kinds of built-in theoretical hierarchies in television studies that have shaped the ways scholars position and evaluate television institutions, forms and workers in the Japanese context. I specifically address a much neglected and disciplined space of TV writers and argue that such a state is related to the theoretical and methodological perceptions of writers as marginalized media workers. Ultimately, I urge that researchers studying TV writers use critical ethnographic methods to deal with the issue of power relationship between the researcher and his or her subject.

The Use of Race as Political Strategy by Political Candidates: A Case Study of Opinions Expressed by Voters during a U.S. Presidential Campaign • Niranjala D. Weerakkody, Deakin University (Australia) • Taking the social constructionist position, this case study examines the opinions expressed on race by voters in depth and focus group interviews at different locations and different stages of the 1992 U.S. presidential campaign and what effect media messages shown as stimuli to the focus groups had on these opinions. It qualitatively analyzes the framing of these opinions by both whites and non-whites, under the themes “Candidates’ racial prejudice” and “Race is used as political strategy.”

Ideology and Race in California: The New York Times Coverage of Proposition 187 • Chris Williams, Texas at Austin • Using critical cultural and media sociology theories of ideology, race and the media, this study examines the New York Times’ coverage of Proposition 187, California’s plan to deny social services to undocumented immigrants, the vast majority of whom are non-white. It concludes that although the Times editorialized against the discriminatory nature of 187, its news coverage perpetuated the elite “blame the undocumented” discourse that diverted public attention from other important aspects of the immigration issue.

The Political Economy and Content of Television: The Soap Opera Paradigm • James H. Wittebols, Niagara • This paper seeks to show how television has responded to the increasing pressure to focus on market interests by appropriating elements from soap operas which have proven so successful in fulfilling market values. The techniques present in soaps which serve market interests are applied to an analysis of non-soap programming to present evidence that the political economy of television plays a significant role in how stories are told across fictional, sports and public affairs programming.

<< 2000 Abstracts

Communication Theory and Methodology 2000 Abstracts

Communication Theory and Methodology Division

Faculty
Profiling TV Ratings Users: Content-Based Advisories and Their Adoption • Robert Abelman and David Atkin, Cleveland State • In the aftermath of the ineffectiveness of the age-based MPAA television advisory ratings, this investigation examined parents’ use of the content-based ratings in their decision-making. The parents most likely to utilize TV ratings information tended to fit the profile of the target audience formed by the literature and set by the television industry: infrequent mediators of their children’s televiewing who are likely to employ a highly restrictive (deprivation-based) method of mediation, believe that television can have a significant impact on children, and are more concerned with behavioral- than cognitive-level effects.

Gender Schema and Alcohol-Related Messages: An Extension of the Message Interpretation Process Model • Julie L. Andsager, Erica Weintraub Austin, and Bruce E. Pinkleton, Washington State • The Message Interpretation Process Model posits that adolescents employ logic and emotion in analyzing messages. Gender schema theory argues that gender roles are internalized by adolescence; gender should affect information processing. We exposed 578 ninth and twelfth graders to eight alcohol-related messages. Boys were more aware of production values, especially in advertisements; girls noted emotional appeals. Both boys and girls found fantasy-based messages amusing; they were affected by realism. The MIP model should incorporate gender.

The Effects of Increased Awareness on College Students’ Interpretations of Magazine Advertisements for Alcohol • Erica Weintraub Austin, Amber Reaume, John Silva, Petra Guerra, Neva Geisler, Luxelvira Gamboa, Orlalak Phakakayai, and Bryant Kuechle, Washington State • An experiment with 496 college students tested whether heightened awareness during media exposure would affect the message interpretation process by enhancing skepticism, with the enhanced skepticism influencing both affective and cognitive aspects of decision making. The results suggest that skepticism has affective and logical components, which can be represented by trust (more affective) and perceived realism (more logical), and that skepticism’s effects on affective and logical decision making are revealed somewhat differently.

Negative Implications of the Third-Person Effect on Program Assessment Validity: An Experiment with the Drug Abuse Resistance Education Program • Stephen Banning, Texas A&M • While the third-person effect hypothesis has undergone considerable testing since its inception nearly three decades ago, this research is the first project to investigate an applied use for the concept. This study introduces a formula for calculating a differential impact index and demonstrates with an experiment using middle-school age students in a Drug Abuse Resistance Education (DARE) program that a first-person or third-person effect can produce a confounding variable into traditional program evaluations.

An Effect Model of Political News and Political Advertising: The 1996 Presidential Election • Mahmoud A. M. Braima, Southern University and A&M College; Thomas J. Johnson, and Jayanthi Sothirajah, Southern Illinois-Carbondale • To determine the positive influence of exposure to an election campaign and the negative impact of the advertising campaigns of a presidential contest, we used structural equations to simultaneously assess 11 causal links between issue involvement, political news exposure, political advertising exposure, political news attention, political advertising attention, knowledge of candidates’ issue stands and voting intention. Two data sets, one from a survey of 320 adult residents of Jackson County in Illinois during the primaries and another from a survey of 368 adult residents of Pulaski County in Arkansas prior to the election, were used in the study.

Sex, Alcohol and Billboards: Memory, Attitude Change, and Purchase Intention • Xiaomei Cai, Annie Lang, Kevin Wise, and Seungwhan Lee, Indiana • This study examines the effects of product type and sexual appeals in billboard messages on college students’ recall and recognition in relation to their drinking levels. Results show that alcohol billboards are recalled better than not-alcohol billboards, particularly for alcohol billboards using sexual appeals. Heavy drinkers recall alcohol brands better than light drinkers. However, sexual appeals reduce brand free recall for heavy drinkers. Heavy drinkers also have more positive attitude towards alcohol products.

Conceptualizing and Testing the Construct “Impactiveness”: Analyzing the Effect of Visual Stimuli Eliciting Eye-Fixations, Orienting Responses and Memory-Stored Images on Ad Recall • Fiona Chew and Jay Sethuraman, Syracuse • Impactiveness is coined and proposed as a construct consisting of visual stimuli which elicit eye-fixations, orienting responses and/or memory-stored images. It was conceptualized using the seven-step inductive-deductive process outlined by Donohew and Palmgreen and predicated on theories of attention and involvement. Eighty color print ads from Gallup and Robinson’s 1996 Which Ad Pulled Best were coded and analyzed for impactiveness which was hypothesized to obtain higher recall. Findings seemed to support this hypothesis and validated the construct.

Use of Cause-Related Marketing Ads to Bolster Image in the Light of Negative News • Sameer Deshpande and Jacqueline Hitchon • University of Wisconsin – Madison • This paper presents an experimental study conducted among 178 subjects to test a bolstering strategy from Image Restoration Theory. Three different kinds of ads were compared with respect to bolstering brand image and the reputation of a nonprofit organization (NPO) after the release of an unfavorable news story: brand ads, PSAs, and Cause-Related Marketing (CRM) ads. As hypothesized, CRM ads produced more favorable responses than brand ads prior to scandal, but lost their advantage in the light of negative news.

Transactionalism Revisited: The Development of Transactional Thinking and its Impact on Communication Theory • Wolfgang Eichhorn, der Universitat Munchen • In the first half of the 20th century, John Dewey developed a concept of transaction as an alternative to stimulus-response based theories of human perception and action. Consequences of the transactional paradigm can be found in philosophy, psychology, semiotics and communication theory. This paper gives a short overview over the development of the concept of transaction and the way transactional thinking into communication theory and suggests an increased incorporation of the concept into reception research.

News Information Processing as Mediator Between Motivations and Public Affairs Knowledge • William Eveland, Jr., Ohio State • Empirical support is offered for the proposed cognitive mediation model of learning from the news. The cognitive mediation model is situated within an information processing framework and integrates existing theory and research on uses and gratifications and news information processing. It proposes that motivations for news media use influence the processing to which the news information is put, and that this processing is the proximal determinant of learning from the news.

The Assimilation of Soap Opera Portrayals into Viewer’s Relational Knowledge Structures • Steven J. Hoekstra, Kansas Weslyan and Tom Grimes and Catherine Cozzarelli, Kansas State • Two studies were conducted to test the degree to which exposure to soap opera television influences individuals’ relational schemas. Participants in the first study completed a series of questionnaires that measured their beliefs about romanticism, relationship fragility, the utility of conversation in relationships, and sexual attitudes. All participants reported their habits for television viewing in general and soap opera viewing in particular. Results showed that general and relationship-specific beliefs predicted relationship satisfaction, but that soap opera viewing time did not appear to be a central influence in either general or specific relationship beliefs.

Communication Behavior as a Critical Factor on the Third-Person Effect • Yu-Wei Hu, National Taiwan Normal University • This study examines the influence of communication behavior on the magnitude of the third-person effect. The results of a telephone survey indicate that, during an election campaign, higher level of media use will reduce the magnitude of the third-person effect. Moreover, while previous studies had ignored the possible influence of interpersonal communication on the third-person effect, this study finds a significant negative correlation between interpersonal communication and the third-person effect.

Neighborhoods, Communication and Policial Beliefs • Leo W. Jeffres, Richard Perloff, David Atkin, and Kim Neuendorf, Cleveland State • Although people tend to mobilize around local problems and restrict their political involvement at other times, the political communication literature generally has focused on national politics and elections. This is particularly surprising in investigations of political efficacy since it is at the community level that people should feel more efficacious. Also, both mass and interpersonal communication should be more significant locally given their importance in strengthening community ties. The study reported here focuses on these relationships in a community context, with a survey of six inner-city neighborhoods and six suburbs also classified on status using census data.

Receiver Control of Pacing with Mass Media: Effects on Comprehension and Persuasion • Tom Kelleher, University of Hawaii-Manoa • This study tests receiver control of pacing as a variable for examining learning and persuasion outcomes with mass media. Fifty students participated in the study’s 2X2 factorial experiment. Receiver control of pacing and the presence of images in the stimuli were the dichotomous independent variables and comprehension and attitudes toward the stimulus material were the main dependent variables. Results of the study showed that print and Web conditions • media that allow receivers control of pacing • had a significant advantage over radio and video in affecting comprehension of the science-related stimulus material from NASA. Control of pacing did not have an advantage in affecting attitudes.

Revisiting the News Media’s Liberal Bias: An Alternative Measurement of Journalists’ Political Ideologies • Tien-tsung Lee, Hawaii Pacific • A traditional approach to answer whether the news media have a liberal bias is to survey journalists. Findings of previous studies suggest that journalists tend to identify themselves as liberals and are more likely to vote for Democrats. Such results have been used to support the argument that the news media have a liberal bias. The present study revisits the issue with a more refined measurement of political ideology, and concludes that the liberal bias claim is only a myth.

Media Influences on Voter Learning, Cynicism, and the Vote in an Off-Year Issue Election • Glenn Leshner and Maria E. Len-Rios, University of Missouri • This study examined the influence of campaign news and advertising media on voter knowledge, cynicism and voting in a 1999 issue election. It also compared the patterns of association between three measures of vote behavior • vote likelihood, self-report vote, and actual vote • and demographic, political, and media variables. Two cross-sectional telephone surveys were administered • one month before the vote and the other immediately after the election. Hierarchical multiple regression models were tested. Attention to all of the campaign media predicted knowledge about the dominant issue on the ballot at the beginning of the campaign, but only attention to newspapers predicted knowledge at the end of the campaign.

The Effects of Erotica and Dehumanizing Pornography in an Online Interactive Environment • Chad Mahood, Sriram Kalyanaraman, and S. Shyam Sundar, Pennsylvania State • The present study employed a fully mixed 3 (low vs. medium vs. high interactivity) X 2 (erotica vs. de-humanizing pornography) factorial between-subjects design. After exposure to dehumanizing material, subjects held less sexual conservatism. Medium interactivity led to the most sex role satisfaction. An interaction effect showed that exposure to dehumanizing pornography with medium and high levels of interactivity led to more acceptance of violence toward women, while highly interactive erotica led to less acceptance of violence toward women.

Exploring News Media Use and Interpersonal Communication as Correlates of Accuracy and Inaccuracy in the Perception of the Climate of Opinion • Ann Marie Major, Pennsylvania • This study examines the psychological and social correlates of accuracy and inaccuracy in assessments of the climate of opinion about environmental problems from a telephone survey of 1002 adults. News media use, news media influence, and information-seeking were associated consistently with accurate assessments of the majority opinion. Problem and constraint recognition provided a means of determining whether or not respondents were accurate or were simply projecting their own opinions to the majority. Interpersonal discussions and environmental concern were associated with inaccuracy.

Cognitive Structure as a Mediator of the Influence of Communication • Jack M. McLeod and Jessica Zubric, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Nojin Kwak, University of Michigan; Maria Powell, Weiwu Zhang, and Sameer Deshpande, with Dhavan Shah and Mike Schmierbach, University of Wisconsin-Madison • This study demonstrates the importance of examining the processes that mediate the influences of communication on civic life. In this study, we analyzed the role of cognitive structure as affected by media use and interpersonal communication, and its mediating role influencing willingness to participate in a public forum on the urban growth issue. Findings illustrated that various communication patterns had distinct effects on four dimensions of cognitive structure: width, depth, causal attribution and remedy articulation.

The Ideological Dimensions of Stereotyping in the Media: Toward a Conceptual Clarification • Rick Clifton Moore, Boise State • Searching for stereotypes in the mass media is a common scholarly endeavor. Much research assumes that the media are full of stereotypes and their effects are deleterious. This study investigates the concept of “stereotype” as developed by Lippmann and examines current use of the term in mass communication research. The author suggests that most often the term is poorly conceptualized and the implications of this misconception deserve closer scrutiny by the academy.

Discussion Networks, Media Use, and Deliberative Conversation • Patricia Moy and John Gastil, University of Washington • Not all political conversation is deliberative conversation, characterized by an openness to political conflict, the absence of conversational dominance, clear and reasonable argument, and mutual comprehension. Extending McLeod, Scheufele, and Moy’s (1999) model of democratic engagement, we examine the antecedents of deliberative conversation. Structural equation modeling results indicate that network characteristics affected deliberative conversation. Print media use and interpersonal discussion tend to enhance deliberative conversation, while television news viewing hindered logic of argument and comprehension of others’ viewpoints.

Press-State Relations: A Critical Reappraisal • Hong-Won Park, University of Minnesota • This essay offers a critical reappraisal of the current thought about press-state relations. Existing studies of press-state relations are examined in terms of the normative, institutional, and symbolic approaches. To base press-state relations on a concrete theoretical framework, I consider models of power. Gramsci’s concept of hegemony and Foucault’s notion of power/knowledge enables to see the press-state nexus as a discursive terrain, where diverse actors struggle for dominant position.

The Theory is the Press: A View of the Press as Developer of Informal Theory • Robert Pennington, New Mexico State • This article proposes that the press develops and disseminates informal theories, derived from the primary culture, that govern institutions. Press freedom requires freedom from cultural restraints that are difficult to recognize. Emphasis on press content often ignores implicit relationships. In the absence of explicit relationship definition, culture defines the relationships in press content. Conflict occurs when social components reject or ignore an asserted relationship type. This study recommends analyzing relationship as monadic, dyadic or triadic.

Media Articulated Hegemony: A Symmetrical Perspective of Dominance and Resistance • Thomas Ruggiero, University of Texas at El Paso • A media “articulated” hegemony model, while recognizing that domination is presumed in any capitalist system, also acknowledges the possibility of subordinate resistance. It is in the articulation and de-articulation of media rhetoric that a political and/or cultural space is created by the tension between the two, and resistance may occur. Through a rhetorical analysis of the failed 1994 Disney’s America theme park, this study found that specialized media served as circulators of both universalizing and singularizing ideological narratives about American society.

Optimistic Bias and the Third-Person Effect: Public Estimations of Y2K Effects on Self and Others • Michael B. Salwen and Michael Dupagne, University of Miami • Telephone surveys during late November and early December 1999 gauged Americans’ beliefs about the predicted detrimental effects of Y2K and the persuasive effects of news coverage of Y2K. Drawing on optimistic bias and the third-person effect, approaches that share a “perceptual component” • an awareness of the existence of others and others’ beliefs and opinions • respondents appraised effects on “self” and on others. Optimistic bias predicts that individuals believe they are less likely than other people to experience deleterious events.

Real Talk: Manipulating the dependent variable in spiral of silence research • Dietram A. Scheufele, James Shanahan, and Eunjung Lee, Cornell • This study examines a key issue in spiral of silence research: whether the “realism” of the setting in which respondents are asked to express opinions affects their willingness to do so. Some reviews of spiral of silence theory have argued that survey measures do not capture the effect adequately because respondents see them as too hypothetical. In this study, we use a split-ballot technique to compare two closely related ways of assessing willingness to express opinions.

Individual Losses and Societal Gains: Interactive Framing Effects on the Activation of Mental Models • Dhavan V. Shah, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Nojin Kwak, University of Michigan; Mike Schmierbach, and Jessica Zubric, with Jack M. McLeod, Maria Powell, and Hee Jo Keum, University of Wisconsin-Madison • Although numerous studies have examined the effects of frames on individual behaviors and opinions, there has been a paucity of work looking at the possible interactions among frames. Additionally, relatively little research has tested the multivariate effects of frames on basic cognitive variables, such as common-sense mental models. Using a 2X3 experimental manipulation concerning urban growth embedded within a broader survey, this study tests for the interactive effects of two different frame dimensions on the cognitions of individual respondents concerning this issue.

Self-serving Bias and Self-esteem in Estimating Risk? • Michael A. Shapiro and David A. Dunning, Cornell University • Understanding how people form estimates of risk is important to understanding how people process risk-related messages. One speculation is that risk estimates may be related to people’s motivation to put themselves and their actions in the best possible light • a self-serving bias. Studies in other domains have shown that challenges to self-esteem tend to increase self-serving bias. The experiment reported here did indeed find a self-serving bias about behaviors related to health risk.

Effects of Communication on Economic and Political Development: A Time Series Analysis • Kim A. Smith, Iowa State • Using time series data from 1965-1996 in 107 nations, this paper re-examines effects of social, mass media and telecommunication indicators on economic and political development. Among the indicators of social development, urbanization showed a much stronger relationship with economic and political development than percent illiterate or school enrollment. Newspapers, radios, and televisions per 1,000 people all substantially predicted economic and political development. Only telephone mainlines per capita among the telecommunication indicators significantly covaried over the 32-year period of the study with both types of development.

Modeling Information Seeking, Exposure and Attention in an Expanded Theory of Reasoned Action • Craig Trumbo, University of Wisconsin-Madison • This article examines the use of communication variables in research based on Ajzen and Fishbein’s Theory of Reasoned Action (TRA) and Ajzen’s Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB). The literature review shows that a significant amount of such work has included communication and information variables, but perhaps not in a manner designed to purposefully elaborate the function of communication and information in these theories. In fact, a recent meta-analysis of the TRA-TPB literatures identifies a half-dozen variables that function significantly in the TRA-TPB, none of which involve communication or information.

Play Theory Revisited: Dimensions of Play in Television and Internet Use • Stanley T. Wearden and Joseph M. Harper, Kent State • It has been more than 30 years since William Stephenson’s book, “The Play Theory of Mass Communication” was published. Since then, an intuitively appealing and plausible theory has been largely neglected. Writing about it 15 years after the book’s publication, Stephenson himself acknowledged that the book had been a polemic for Q methodology and urged that the methodological approach to the theory be broadened in order to better understand it. This study attempts to do just that.

Priming Perceptions of Foreign Countries: How the Media Influence How We Think About Other Nations • Lars Willnat, Joseph Graf, and Paul Brewer, George Washington • This experimental study attempts to broaden the scope of priming research in three ways. First, unlike previous priming experiments, which have primarily relied on television news to test the effects of media priming, this study test the priming effects of printed news stories. Second, rather than assessing the impact of media priming on evaluations of political figures, as has been done in the past, we propose that the media can also prime other, less narrow defined political perceptions.

Show Me Your Beer: How Sex and Alcohol Affect the Cognitive Processing of Billboards • Kevin Wise, Annie Lang, and Xiaomei Cai, Indiana • This study investigates college students’ cognitive responses to the presence of alcohol and sexual appeal on billboards. Results show that subjects orient to billboards, and that the presence of sexual appeal in billboards leads to more attentive controlled processing. Furthermore, the interaction between the presence of alcohol and sexual appeal significantly affects the extent to which orienting occurs, as well as attention, arousal and emotional valence.

Effects of Sponsoring Negative Political Advertising on Political Decision-Making: The Roles of Involvement and Source Credibility in the Development of Voter Cynicism • Kak Yoon, Sogang University; Bruce E. Pinkleton and Wonjun Ko, Washington State • Candidates’ use of negative political advertising continues to generate objections among citizens and concern among scholars and journalists. We examined the effect of negative political advertising on political decision-making by investigating the roles of situational voter involvement and source credibility in participants’ vote determination and their development of cynicism. Research results indicate that participants’ voting intention for the sponsor of negative political advertising was higher for a high-credibility candidate, regardless of their level of involvement.

Agreement Index as a Reliability Indicator for Nominal Scales with Two Coders • Xinshu Zhao, University of North Carolina • ABSTRACT NOT AVAILABLE.

Student
By the Numbers: Documenting the “Newspaper Habit” • Clyde Bentley, University of Oregon • Studies of newspaper readership have traditionally focused on demographic predictors. This study examines whether habit • a factor much less obvious than the powerful predictors of age, education and income • is at work in the importance to the individual of newspaper readership. Based on a statewide telephone survey, the study showed habit is at work in the individual’s perception of how important it is to read a newspaper. Reading habits or ritual not only correlated positively with the importance of newspaper reading, but remained a significant predictor when age, education and income were controlled through regression.

News Framing as a Multi-Paradigmatic Research Program: A Response to Entman • Paul D’Angelo, Villanova • The concept “framing” is at the center of a growing body of mass media research, centering particularly on news framing. The purpose of this essay is to respond to Entman’s (1993) call for the establishment of a paradigm of news framing research. Drawing on work in the sociology of knowledge, it is argued that news framing is a research program that consists of three inter-related paradigms, introduced here as constructionist, critical, and cognitive.

It’s All About the Information: Salience Effects on the Perceptions of News Exemplification • Francesca Dillman Carpentier, Hong-Sik Yu, and Coy Callison, University of Alabama • This study expands upon previous base rate v. exemplification research in examining salience effects on perceptions of mediated messages. Using an ecologically valid news stimulus, salience is shown to interact with base rate and exemplified information with interesting results. Case information is shown to impact issue perceptions under high salience, whereas the more familiar influences of base rate and exemplified text are illuminated under low salience. Implications and directions for further research are discussed.

Issues in Qualification of Electronic Internet-based Sources for Academic and Business Historical Research • Alexander Gorelik and Jodie Peele, University of South Carolina • The paper presents a methodology for qualification of Internet-based information sources. A summary of the existing techniques for qualification of traditional mass communication sources is included. An integrated qualification strategy, consisting of four steps: pre-evaluation, classification, evaluation (application of classification) and criticism is proposed. Techniques and evaluative methods from business are adapted, and new techniques presented, aimed at reduction of ambiguity in “volatile” information and non-linear documents, such as hyper-text or multimedia documents.

News Content Matters: An Experimental Study of the Agenda-setting Effect of News Stories Depicting Negative Consequence • Yulian Li, University of Minnesota • This is an experimental study on the agenda-setting effect of threat messages or fear appeal messages. Applying the protection motivation theory, this study found that there was a positive linear relationship between the amount of threat and people’s perception of issue importance. Obtrusive issues were more susceptible to manipulation than unobtrusive issues.

Substantive and Affective Attributes on the Corporate Merger Agenda: An Examination of Second-Level Agenda-Setting Effects • Joon-Soo Lim, University of Florida • Two broad sets of attributes on the merger agenda were investigated to find whether the transfer of attributes of agenda from the media to the public occurred. Results showed that media affective attributes have varied with time and media types. Combining content analysis and Gallup Poll results, this study revealed there have been similar patterns between public opinion on the corporate mergers and media’s substantive and affective attributes on the merger agenda.

Political Distance and Message Desirability: Three Studies of Political Advertising and the Third-Person Effect • Patrick Meirick, University of Minnesota • This paper conceives of social distance as political distance, using Democrats, Republicans and the public as the groups of others on whom effects of political ads are judged. It also argues that desirability of political ads depends upon the recipient’s affiliation. In three studies using student and non-student samples, a pattern of increasing effects with increasing distance from the self was found for ads from an opposite-party candidate, while the reverse was found for ads from same-party candidates.

Timing of the Third-Person Effect Study and Winter Weather Advisories • Richard Waters, Syracuse • Through surveys before and after a winter ice storm (N=128), this project explores the strength of the relationship between the third-person effect and winter weather advisories. Drawing on previous research, which tested the nature of communications and the third-person effect’s influence on opinions on earthquake predictions, this project found people positively viewed winter weather advisories after ice storms; however, they viewed them negatively before ice storm. The third-person effect was present before the ice storm occurred, and it was not present after the inclement weathers.

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