Thesis (Ph.D.)--Ohio University, June, 2006. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 183-192)

Thesis (Ed. D.)--Illinois State University, 1998. / Title from title page screen, viewed July 12, 2006. Dissertation Committee: Michael A. Lorber (chair), Joe Parks, Jeffrey B. Hecht, Philip P. Hermiz. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 91-93) and abstract. Also available in print.

Thesis (M.S.)--Ohio University, August, 2004. / Title from PDF t.p. Includes bibliographical references (p. 100-113)

No description available.

Using qualitative content analysis, this research study explored the Gauteng Provincial Government (GPG) social media use, with specific reference to Facebook, as a communication tool to engage with stakeholders. The study looked at how Facebook is used to promote two-way communication between the government and citizens, based on the principles of the Excellence Theory, which advocates for communication models developed by Grunt and Hunt (1984). The diagonal principles by Kent and Taylor (1998) used as a strategic framework to facilitate relationship building with the public and the organisations, were also explored. The results indicated that the majority of the departments are active on Facebook, however not at a satisfactory level. The majority of the departments failed to use all the six dialogic principles to leverage two-way communication, in particular creation of the dialogue loop which facilitates the building of ongoing relationships and feedback. Some of the departments have not fully taken the opportunity to increase the engagement and dialogue through posting photos on Facebook walls. The numbers of videos posted were extremely low. The majority of the departments utilised the social media platform, Facebook, as a one-way communication, such as publishing of media statements, announcements, media conferences and interviews among others. Most of the departments use Facebook for information dissemination especially on events and campaigns. The poor use of Facebook can be attributed to the challenges such as a lack of resources, especially a budget, lack of skills on effective use of social media, the continuous use of one-way communication by the government and a lack of budget among others. The findings correlate to the previous studies that found a lack of proper engagement, dialogue and interactivity on government’s Facebook pages.

This study explored the guidelines advocated by selected media content analysis with the aim of identifying effective approaches to evaluate audience responses to promotional messages. Drawing from literature and documented deliberations by industry professionals, content-specific analysis protocols were applied and tested using a case study representing topic-specific responses to the Two Oceans Quay 5 product launch. In doing so, a logical observation of the communication in unpaid media placements and relevant discussions distributed in public media channels was completed. It is in this sense that this research enriches the study of public relations with a particular focus on output-driven evaluation. It provides insights into qualitative and quantitative publicity measurement and suggests how these methods can be useful to explicate the impact of media coverage as a public relations element. While it largely focused on discovering improved media content analysis solutions, this study revealed that content-driven analysis can only be useful when its protocols are aligned with the context of the data and if communication practitioners remain aware and transparent of its subjectivity. In this regard, this study helps to generate an understanding of the subjective dynamic of public relations and the importance of in-depth and adaptable publicity assessments to help distinguish public relations as a purposeful branding function next to advertising and marketing.

Agreement between trained and untrained coders in assessing television content was investigated. A model integrating the different approaches to content analysis was proposed. The model contains three dimensions: audience coders versus expert coders, microanalysis versus macroanalysis, and quantitative versus qualitative analysis. The audience versus expert coders facet of that model was evaluated by having university students watch and assess the content of 24 television programs chosen from prime-time on the basis of their popularity. They were not trained in content analysis and did not know the questions about which they were asked until after viewing their program. Their evaluations were compared with similar evaluations given previously by trained (expert) coders. Each of the 24 programs was watched by 5 male and 5 female naive coders (total N=240). The groups were balanced for ethnicity and socioeconomic status. A statistic developed especially for this research was used to compare the naive and expert ratings on 22 selected variables. The results indicated that untrained and trained coders in general evaluated the programs similarly. Moreover, the questions on which the experts tended not to agree (that is, were unreliable) were generally the same ones on which the untrained coders did not agree, both amongst themselves and with the experts. / Arts, Faculty of / Psychology, Department of / Graduate

No description available.

Considering the unique cultural and political contexts through which spirituality emerges, this study investigates the lived-experience of spiritual life in USA, India, and China. In this study, culture was defined as geographic (primarily) and ethnically clustered groups of individuals with broad relative commonality in socio-cultural histories. Religion was considered an aspect of spirituality and spiritual life. A qualitative coding frame was formulated based on participants’ responses to open-ended questions regarding spirituality. The aim of this study was to clarify the qualitative content of spiritual life with the help of Dedoose, a mixed methods qualitative software. The exploratory approach of this study takes on a cross-culturally comparative lens, and has two primary questions: (1) What are the universal aspects of lived spirituality across cultures, and (2) How does culture shape spiritual experience (e.g., typology, and prevalence). A total of 6112 participants (41% women, mean age of 29 years, range 18–75 years) were recruited from crowdsourcing platforms. The primary thematic categories were religion (religious traditions, religious conversion, religious professionals, religious figures “theophany,” and religious forces “heirophany”), contemplative practice (meditation, mindful movement, prayer, and rituals), ancestors (ancestral worship, dreams about ancestors, and ancestors discussed), natural world (animals, and nature), and metaphysical phenomenon. Metaphysical categories were further parsed apart to include extrasensory perception (telepathy, clairvoyance, precognition, realistic dreams, and intuitive impressions), psychokinesis, survival hypothesis (near death experiences, out of body experiences, and apparitional experiences), and faith and energy healing (recovery/remission of illness, and spiritual practitioners).

The purpose of this study is to illuminate the presence and rhetorical effect of anecdotes in President Clinton's major health care address. It is the health care debate that shows most clearly how Clinton tries to direct a multi-level campaign that attempts to identify his interests (passage of the Health Security Act) with the interests of Congress and the American people. The analysis of his address and remarks during the week of his Joint Session of Congress appearance will demonstrate how Clinton uses anecdotes as a rhetorical tool to address different audiences, and will argue that this use of anecdotes functions to heighten emotional appeal while promoting identification with his audience. Clinton relies on the pathos of anecdotes to pass a health care bill, which will be analyzed according to Kenneth Burke's discussion of political rhetoric. This study adopts a Burkeian perspective on political rhetoric as a means for investigating the problems Clinton faced in confronting the complex and divisive issue of health care. / Graduation date: 1994