Graduate Education Interest Group

Public Perceptions of a Media Saturated Crime: The Case of Mary Kay LeTourneau • Sean Baker, Washington • This paper examines an agenda-setting relationship between a media saturated statutory rape case and public perceptions of the case and issues surrounding it. A survey was conducted asking respondents’ news media exposure and perceptions of statutory rape. It is argued that a non-traditional statutory rape case would increase respondent awareness of this type of crime. The agenda-setting hypothesis was moderately supported. The primary factor which increased respondent’s salience perceptions was amount of television use.

Constructing the Face of AIDS: Debby Feyerick and the Wayne Fischer Story • Che Baysinger, Rutgers University • The following research paper examines a televised weekly news series, which puts a human face on the issue of AIDS. Unlike many news stories today which are sanitized and formulamatic, this story looks take a personal look at one man’s existence and its ultimate end. The series is an excellent example of accountable television news coverage that constructs meaning as it is created rather than sensationalizing events and placing facts into pre-existing contexts which merely reinforce stereotypes.

The Clash of Values Underlying U.S. Credit Unions’ and Banks’ Arguments in Their Public Relations Campaigns • Julie W. O’Neil, Utah • Whether U.S. credit unions should be able to extend their membership beyond traditional groups has been the focus of recent arguments between credit unions and banks. A careful analysis of credit unions’ and banks’ public relations rhetoric provides a clear picture of clash of values underlying either sides’ appeals to the American public and legislators, and established the relevancy of using a value analysis to better understand how the rhetoric of public relations campaigns functions.

<< 1998 Abstracts

Civic Journalism Interest Group

Predicting Successful Internships • Fred Beard and Linda Morton, Oklahoma • Although previous research suggest the characteristics of successful interns and internships, little research has attempted to examine the relationships between them and specific outcomes. The results of a canonical correlation analysis indicates that all the predictors are correlated with successful outcomes; that the predictors account for approximately one-half the variance in successful internships; and that the effectiveness of an intern’s worksite supervisor is the single most important predictor of internship success.

A Phenomenological Study of the Internship Experience: Reflections from Three Perspectives • Emma Daugherty, California State University-Long Beach • Journalism and mass communication educators have long valued and internships for students. With all the importance placed on experiential learning experiences, such as internships, scant literature exists on the subject. In order to understand the underlying expectations and perspectives of the internship experience for the three groups of participants • interns, site supervisors, and internship coordinators • a phenomenological method of inquiry was used in this study. This qualitative study included 15 interns, 15 site supervisors, and 20 faculty internship coordinators as participants and found that similarities and differences in their responses can help improve the internship experience.

Positioning University Internship Programs to Emphasis the Complementary Nature of Theoretical and Applied Training Methods • Teresa Mastin, Michigan State University • The debate continues, theoretical or applied training methods, which method is most appropriate for training students enrolled in university advertising and public relations programs. This paper proposes that university internship programs are qualified to serve in a unique position as harbinger that theoretical and applied methods are indeed complementary and as such should be presented concurrently. Such a stance would help students and practitioners alike make the conceptual link between applied activities and their theoretical underpinnings.

Correlating Grade Point Average with Internship Performance: A Case Study • Michael L. Maynard, Temple University • Analysis of internship grades earned by 132 journalism mass communication students who registered for internship credit at a major Northeastern university show that students with a 2.7 GPA predictably do as well as students with a GPA ranging from 3.0 to 3.3. Accordingly, it is recommended that the GPA cutoff point for internship eligibility at this school be lowered to 2.7, from the previous 3.0 standard. This case study demonstrates the value of measuring actual performance against idealized standards.

<< 1998 Abstracts

Visual Communication Division

The Limits of Copyright Protection for the Use of Visual Works in Motion Pictures, Print Media and Pop Art in the 1990s • Andy Bechtel and Arati Korwar, Louisiana State University • ABSTRACT NOT AVAILABLE.

Creating Visual Metaphors of the Internet • Walter M. Bortz, William R. Davie and Jung-Sook Lee, Southwestern Louisiana • This study examined visual metaphors of the Internet created by college students. The authors applied an Interaction theory to their data from a series of in-depth interviews and classified visual metaphors into metaphoric types. They identified 23 types of visual metaphors, including challenge, navigation, food, privacy, flowing, knowledge and information, and powerful force. They also discussed implications of metaphoric research for communication theory and practice by focusing on the nature of projective or similarity-creating metaphors.

Perceptions of Graphics Versus No Graphics on Web Sites • Rebecca J. Chamberlin, Ohio University • An experiment was conducted to better understanding how the design of a web site affects the viewers’ perceptions of it. High-graphic and low-graphic versions of web sites were compared by five groups of viewers. There was no difference in how difficult the viewers felt it was to find information on the sites. However, different demographic groups had different perceptions of attractiveness and different preference for content or graphics.

Design Characteristics of Public Journalism: Integrating Visual and Verbal Meaning • Renita Coleman, Missouri-Columbia • Public journalists argue that the content of stories generated through public journalism is different from that generated by traditional reporting methods. This prompts the question: If the content of stories generated through public journalism methods is different, and design is driven by content, doesn’t it follow that design for public journalism will be different than design for non-public journalism? Using both quantitative and qualitative methods, this study used the principles of design to explore how public journalism projects have been visually communicated in newspapers practicing the public journalism genre, and how it differs from the visual communication of non-public journalism.

Influencing Creativity in Newsrooms: A Survey of Newspaper, Magazine, and Web Designers • Renita Coleman and Jan Colbert, Missouri-Columbia • Editorial designers (newspaper, magazine and web) are an intrical part of the creative process in the newsroom, yet no research has been done in this area. This study provides insight into what influences the creative abilities of designers by analyzing their personality characteristics and thinking strategies as well as independent variables relevant to their working conditions. Understanding how to foster creativity in design will help newspapers and magazines stay competitive, and help web designers understand more about their nascent medium.

The Development of Standard and Alternative Forms of Photojournalism • Timothy Roy Gleason, Bowling Green State University • By the mid-1950s standard photojournalism practices were established which excluded alternative practices. The paper explores their development from the 1930s through the 1950s. Standards of journalistic objectivity and an emphasis on the denotative qualities of photography were propagated by editors and reporters. This style of photojournalism is presented in contrast to the work of Robert Frank. His photography was not accepted in journalism because of his subjective style.

Visual Design for the World Wide Web: What Does the User Want? • Deborah M. Gross, Florida • This paper examines interface design for the World Wide Web. The author designed a Website and conducted five focus groups to determine issues that were important to potential users. This study indicates that users will play a large role in the evolution of Web design standards. As more media options become available, users’ needs must be gratified. World Wide Web sites should be fast, fresh, exciting and interactive. Further implications for Web design are discussed.

Afterthoughts on the Representational Strategies of the FSA Documentary • Edgar Shaohua Huang, Indiana University • This paper analyzed the truth strategies of documentary photography from the positivist, social constructivist, Marxist, and postmodern perspectives in an attempt to find out what caused the decline of documentary photography and whether traditional documentary can reinvented. The analysis focused on the FSA works (especially on Arthur Rothstein’s famous Skull picture), which have been regarded by photographic communities as classical documentary photography.

Who Gets Named?: Nationality, Race and Gender in New York Times Photograph Cutlines • John M. King, Louisiana State University • This research examined 986 New York Times images to asses the impact of nationality, race and gender on named individuals in cutlines. Chi-square tests, significant at less than .001, showed that Americans were named more often than non-Americans. Caucasians were named more often than Hispanics, Asians and Middle easterners, but less often than people of African descent. Males were named more often than females. Two hypotheses were still supported after controlling for nine story types.

Altered Plates: Photo Manipulation and the Search for News Value in the Early and Late Twentieth Century • Wilson Lowrey, Georgia • Recent cases of news photo manipulation have editors and photo directors up in arms over the dangers of digital technology. Photo manipulation, however, was not born in the digital world • it is only nurtured there. Artists and photographers have been altering and staging photos since the invention of photography in the 19th century. And the period from 1910 to the 1930s, immediately following the perfection of the halftone technique, was perhaps the heyday for news photo manipulation.

The Rhetorical Structure of California Reich: Exploring the Strengths and Dilemmas of Guiding Audience Response in Classical Documentary Filmed in Cinema Verite • Kate Madden, SUNY Brockport • California Reich is a classical documentary filmed in cinema verite style which explores the Neo-Nazi movement in California in the mid-1970s. First aired in 1976, the hour-long film continues in video distribution today and shares space in the “war” section of some video stores. As classical documentary, California Reich fits into a tradition which clearly defines documentary as a rhetorical text which consciously attempts to persuade audiences to a particular point of view about its subject matter.

Effects of Novelty in News Photographs on Attention and Memory • Andrew Mendelson, Southern University-Edwardsville • Two experiments are reported that examined the effects of novelty in terms of preferences for viewing, viewing time, recall memory, and interest ratings, in an attempt to isolate how atypical news photographs are processed. This research separated the two concepts of content and compositional novelty. Both experiments showed that more novel news photographs attracted attention, were looked at longer, were rated as more interesting, and were better remembered.

When Mona Lisa and Madison Avenue Dance • Kimberly Paul, Texas-Austin • At the International Advertising Festival in Cannes, the success of an advertising campaign is measured not by its effectiveness but by its artfulness, its creativity. No matter that the top award is the Grand Prix. The real reward • and what most of the entrants are hoping for • is recognition that what they are doing is art. However, like Shakespeare’s two houses divided, the cultural families of art and advertising disagree over whether advertising can be a legitimate art form.

The First Person Effect in Mass Communications: Reaction to “The Man Against the Tanks” of Tiananmen • David D. Perlmutter, Louisiana State University • This paper suggests a phenomenon called the “first-person effect,” a useful way to explain how discourse elites, politicians, pundits, journalists, and scholars of visual culture, affect the news pictures that they comment upon. Using the famous image of the man who stood against the tanks neat Tiananmen Square in spring 1989, I examine to what extent a news image actually has the “power” to shock, outrage or change the opinion of the public and the policy makers.

Imperial Imaginary: Photography and the Invention of the British Raj • Shakuntala Rao, SUNY Plattsburgh • This paper attempts to make a connection between photography and the British rule in India. It specifically discusses the work of Samuel Bourne who traveled and photographed the subcontinent extensively from 1863-70. Analysis reveals that Bourne aided in, what refer to, as the “imperial imaginary” of the Raj primarily in his photography of Himalayan landscapes and ancient Indian architecture. Having arrived in India right after the sepoy mutiny, Bourne also faced aesthetic and political dilemmas when confronted with the vastness and variety of the land.

Errors and Inaccuracies in Iowa’s Local Newspaper Information Graphics • Lulu Rodriguez, Iowa State University • This content analysis explores the accuracy with which data are presented in charts in a select sample of community newspapers in Iowa. It examined 187 information graphics contained in 268 issues of 28 community newspapers. Results indicate the dearth of charts in many newspapers. Majority of the charts depicted international, local business and infrastructure development topics. Locator maps were the most predominantly used followed by line graphs and bar graphs. Violations of chart making conventions, misrepresentation of data using percentages, non-comparability of data, inappropriateness of chart, overdressed graphs, and the absence of text-graphic correspondence were the most common mistakes observed.

<< 1998 Abstracts

Scholastic Journalism Division

Education for Scholastic Journalism Revisited: Are We Doing Enough? • Tom Dickson and Mark Paxton, Southwest Missouri State University • The Journalism Education Association in 1987 said high school journalism programs were at risk. We surveyed all colleges and universities in the country with communications-related programs to try to determine to what extent they were preparing future and current scholastic journalism teachers. We concluded that few journalism and mass communication programs were involved in scholastic journalism education and that those that were involved weren’t doing enough.

Job Descriptions and Responsibilities of Scholastic Press Association Directors • Julie E. Dodd, Florida • A 25-item questionnaire was e-mailed to directors or presidents of 40 state, regional and national scholastic press associations, with 26 (65% responding). Of the 16 state SPA directors who were university employees, five were in tenure-track positions, and only two said they were expected to conduct scholarly research. The SPA directors reported the most enjoyable and most difficult part of their SPA work was working with the teachers in the association. The second most difficult part of the job was their overall workload.

Look Who’s Reading Newspapers: The Impact of a Citywide High School Newspaper on Student Media Use • Elinor Kelley Grusin and M. David Arant, Memphis • In fall 1997 the University of Memphis began publishing a monthly citywide high school newspaper, a joint effort with the Memphis daily newspaper, The Commercial Appeal, and the Memphis City Schools. This paper reports the launch of The Teen Appeal, its first year of operation and the results of a survey designed to measure high school student media use and the impact of the citywide high school newspaper.

Factors Affecting the Degree to Which the Student Press of Michigan is Subjected to Prior Review and/or Prior Restraint • Kimberly A. Lauffer, Florida • A 55-item questionnaire was sent to 350 randomly selected high school publications advisors in Michigan. The response rate was 55 percent after the third wave. While an adviser’s experience was not significantly correlated with incidence of censorship, an adviser’s perception of administration as likely to censer was. Size of school was significantly correlated with how advisers perceived administrators’ views of prior review as was size of school and whether that school had an editorial policy regarding student publications.

Learning to Do the Right Thing: Assessing Knowledge of Media Ethics of Leading High School Journalism Students in Louisiana • Joseph A. Mirando, Southeastern Louisiana University • The study is composed of an assessment of journalism students’ knowledge of media ethics. Results of an achievement test administered to 116 of Louisiana’s top-rated journalism students showed that students were able to recognize general moral concepts but demonstrated little sensitivity concerning issues of media ethics. School administrators and curriculum planners in school districts in Louisiana are urged to carefully study the results and re-evaluate state-mandated lesson plans on ethics.

Student Internet Rights • Megan Moriarty, Wisconsin-Milwaukee • What rights do students have to use school computers and related computer networks to access the Internet? What right do they have during such computer use? The is little to understanding of the Internet at schools, which is likely to lead to rash decisions by school officials to protect students. To comprehend student Internet rights, a clear understanding of the following is necessary: Internet, analogies for the Internet, constitutional rights about these analogies, and students’ rights with regard to these analogies.

Incorporating Media Studies in the High School Social Science Curriculum: Perspectives of South Florida Teachers • C.A. Tuggle, Florida International University; Don Sneed and K. Tim Wulfemeyer, San Diego State University • This study reports the results of a mail survey of high school social science educators. Respondents gave their views on the need for systematic study of the media at the high school level. The teachers in the nation’s fifth-largest school district also offered their views on where in the curriculum media studies might most appropriately be placed, whether they consider themselves adequately prepared to teach about the media, and which types of media and/or media-related industries should be studied.

<< 1998 Abstracts

Radio-TV Journalism Division

Local Television Journalism: Developing Ethics through Discussion • Chris W. Allen, Jeremy H. Lipschultz and Michael L. Hilt, Nebraska-Omaha • The purpose of this paper is to examine the views of local television news producers about ethical policies and situations they face, and to see if their political orientation makes a difference. A majority of respondents agreed that it was important for a television newsroom to have a code of ethics or discussion of ethics in the newsroom. Most often producers perceived that their newsrooms were involved in discussions of fairness, balance, and objectivity; allocating airtime to opposing interest groups or political candidates; and, providing right of reply to criticism.

Network Television News Coverage of the Environment and the Impact of the Electronic Newsletter Greenwire • Claudette Guzan Artwick, Washington and Lee University • This study examines the role of the electronic newsletter Greenwire in setting the environmental agenda for network television news. A content analysis found that networks that subscribe to Greenwire covered more environmental news than the network that did not subscribe. It also found differences in the types of environmental stories covered. Interviews with news personnel suggest that Greenwire plays an indirect agenda-setting role for its network subscribers. Greenwire appears to highlight the environmental news agenda, while events drive what network television news reports on the environment.

The Relationship of Affiliation Change to Changes in Television News Ratings • Marianne Barrett, Arizona State University • This study uses Nielsen ratings data from February 1994, 1995 and 1996 to examine the relationship between network affiliation change and changes in ratings for local and network television news. The key finding is that, contrary to what was expected, there is a significant negative relationship between a change in local news ratings and affiliation change, particularly a change to Fox, but that no such relationship exists for network news programs.

Advertising’s Influence on Broadcast News Content: A Study of Student Attitudes • Hubert W. Brown and Beth E. Barnes, Syracuse University • Much has been written in both the trade and popular press regarding advertising’s influence on new content. Virtually all of the discussion around the issue is from the news point of view. The present study presents both the news and advertising perspectives through results of a survey of broadcast journalism and advertising students. Students were asked to indicate their relative agreement with a range of statements on the issue of advertising’s influence on news content.

Constructing International Spectacle on Television: CCTV News and China’s Window on the World, 1992-1996 • Tsan-Kuo Chang, Minnesota and Chen Yanru, Nanyang Technological University • Using the perspective of social construction of reality as a framework, the purpose of this paper is threefold: First, to examine the form and content of China’s national TV news in different settings (foreign news vs. foreign policy news); second, to determine the changes, if any, of its reporting of international sepctacle over time; and third, to identify the fundamental pattern of its window on the world through an analysis of network of countries that have persistently attracted China’s news attention and are presented accordingly.

Albert M. Primo: Creator of the “Eyewitness” Television News Format • Marie Curkan-Flanagan, Tennessee-Knoxville • Albert Primo is far from a household name but what he set in motion 30 years ago, in the field of broadcast news, set the standard and style for future generations of broadcast journalists. This study focuses on the man who began his career as a mailroom attendant, and quickly scaled the ladder as copy writer, reporter, film editor, and finally, news producer. Finally in 1968 he was given the news director’s job at WABC, in New York City.

A Content Analysis of Dateline NBC and NBC Nightly News: The Infiltration of the Youformation Story into News Magazines and Mainstream News • Jeff Demas, Ohio University • Recent criticism of “mainstream” news includes charges that the lines between it and “magazine-style” programs have become more blurred. Critics say that mainstream news includes more tabloid-style reporting and celebrity news than hard news. Through content analysis of NBC Nightly News and Dateline NBC, this study researches those charges. The study also researches a particular genre of “Could this happen to you?” type stories, called youformation by the researcher. Results indicate that from 1992 to 1997, Nightly News content begins to look more like Dateline, and not vice versa.

Priming Reporters: A Study on How the Willie Horton Case Altered the Portrayal of Criminals • James Devitt, Pennsylvania • This paper reports that after the William Horton case became prominent, network new altered visual depictions of black and white criminals. Black criminals increasingly appeared in visual similar to those that depicted Horton while white criminals were shown in different ways. These findings are evidence of visual framing. As an explanation for visual framing, this paper suggests the concept of visual priming, a process by which the news media alter the visual portrayal of issues or phenomena to reflect a salient incident.

Legal Concerns in TV Newsrooms: A National Survey of Local Television News Directors • Paul D. Driscoll, Sigman L. Splichal and Leonardo Ferreira, Miami • A mail survey of 360 local television news directors was conducted to measure concerns about media law issues and the extent to which legal considerations may affect news decision. Respondents answered a series of questions about their experiences and concerns regarding a variety of legal issues, including libel, invasion of privacy, trespass while newsgathering, and station news policies. Responses to the survey were compared with one conducted in 1995.

Computer-Assisted Reporting: A Nationwide Survey of Television Newsrooms • Sonya Forte Duhe, South Carolina • This study, reveals that computer-assisted reporting is employed only in its most basic form • use of the Internet. Fewer than half of the respondents said their newsroom uses spreadsheet, database manager, statistical and mapping software. However, data indicate that at least eight of ten newsrooms have the necessary hardware and software for information analysis.

Learned Helplessness in Local Television News: A 12-Year Update • Grace F. Levine, Quinnipiac College • Local newscasts of three major market network owned stations were found to focus on themes of helplessness in 68.3% of the time devoted to news. Helplessness was most often experienced by the general public. It’s causes were more likely: to be attributed to environmental factors, and described as generalizing across time frames and situations. After a 12 year period, the nature of helplessness in New York local newscasts remained virtually the same.

They’d Rather Be in Pictures, or Would They?: A Content Analysis of Video Bite Bias During TV Network News Coverage of the 1992 and 1996 Presidential Campaigns • Jon A. Shidler, Dennis T. Lowry and Charles Kingsley, Southern Illinois University • In this study bias was evaluated in terms of total air time for each candidate; positive, neutral, and negative presentation of the candidates and their wives; and crown reactions. The overall conclusions were that network coverage of the campaigns dropped by more than 50% in 1996 in terms of number of stories, video bites, and total seconds of air time; video coverage by political candidates was not balanced; the liberal bias hypothesis was supported in both elections in terms of positive coverage.

Women in Television News Management: Do They Make A Difference? • Laura K. Smith and John W. Wright II, Florida • The present study investigated whether females in small, medium, and large market local television news operations make news decisions differently than their male counterparts. The study also investigated perceptions of television news stories produced by males and females. As the proportion of women in local news management increases, the degree of interest females have in the station’s stories increases. As the proportion of women in local news management increases, the proportion of women included as sources in news stories increases.

Youth Voters in 1996: Searching for Political Information From Television News • Karon R. Speckman, Truman State University • Turnout for youth in 1996 was only 33% compared with 37% in 1988 and 38% in 1992. This paper explores the role of television in providing information to young voter. News abstracts from ABC, CBS, NBC, and CNN were examined from September 1, 1996, to November 9, 1996, for coverage and ties to youth voters. Issues of importance to youth were not covered well, nor were stories tied to them as voters. Youths also were not used as sources.

Television News Stand-Up Reports: A Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Market Case Study • Patrick J. Sutherland, Ohio University • A content analysis was done of packages containing stand-up reports of 105 six p.m. newscasts. Interviews about uses of stand-ups were conducted with reporters and executives. Results showed significant difference in stand-upper lengths and styles. #1 KDKA’s packages averaged longer than competitors’ and featured in-depth anchor/reporter exchanges. WTAE’s reports averaged under 90 seconds with little time on-camera for reporters. Most of WPXI’s stand-up reports lasted between 90 seconds and two minutes with little anchor/reporter interaction.

Promise Keepers and TV News Coverage of the Stand in the Gap Rally: Conservative Protestants as an Audience and Public • Hillary Warren, Texas-Austin • Interviews with 22 conservative Protestant families who were members of Promise Keepers, the evangelical men’s movement, were analyzed in conjunction with news media criticism by Christian authors at the time of the Fall 1997 Stand in the Gap Washington, D.C. rally. This paper demonstrates that conservative Protestants operate as both an audience and a public and use their understanding of news frames to challenge the media and reinforce their alignment with their evangelical culture.

<< 1998 Abstracts