In 2009, six years after the initial invasion of Iraq, the attraction of the "War on Terrorism" and the intense patriotism has faded. As a result, the military has watched the numbers of new enlistees steadily drop. The present study investigates whether the United States military has adapted its recruitment strategies in television advertisements to change its public image in the wake of the increasing unpopularity of the Iraq War and disillusionment with U.S. military operations in the broader "War on Terrorism." A textual analysis of U.S. Army and U.S. Navy recruiting advertisements that aired on national cable television during the eight-year period of the Bush administration (January 2001 to January 2009) was conducted to analyze the use of impression management and issues management in strategic messages and themes in the advertisements. The textual analysis of television recruiting advertisements found that issues management strategies were used to address changes in the social and political environment of the period in which they aired. The analysis of recruiting advertisements also found that impression management strategies were used to create a new image of the military and being a soldier in response to shifts in public attitudes that occurred during the period in which the advertisements aired. The findings suggest that the U.S. military can improve its organizational public image by using specific tactics in recruiting advertisements during different periods of wartime.

The media play an important role in society. They interpret political events, actions, policies, and scandals in a manner that citizens can understand. The media use frames to assist in interpretations and descriptions. They may create their own frames or use frames supplied by the political elites. Frames can also lead to biased coverage when used to omit details or present someone in a favorable or unfavorable manner. This study examines the frames the media used during the coverage of President George W. Bushs first political scandal, the Plame Game. On July 14, 2003, Robert Novak exposed the identity of CIA agent Valerie Plame in his syndicated editorial column. Over the next five years the media followed the Plame Game scandal using frames to describe the actors and their actions. A content analysis of three national newspapers shows that the media did use frames in their coverage of this political scandal. The media used frames they created and some that political elites gave them through interviews and press releases. Over the five years, the frames associated with each actor in the Plame Game did change. Even though some individual articles are biased in their coverage of the actors in the scandal, statistical results prove that the cumulative coverage of the Plame Game was balanced. This means that an equal number of positive and negative frames were used to describe each actor and their actions over the course of five years. Little research deals with media framing of political scandals. The results of this study can aid in future research of political scandal framing, and can extend the already existing wealth of framing research.

The rise of the American penny press in the 1830s is thought of as a crucial moment in journalism history that precipitated changes in newspapers that are still evident today. Yet, many specific characteristics of the transition from a predominantly elite mercantile and partisan press to the popular penny press remain unknown, including the changes that occurred in foreign news coverage. This study will examine four newspapers, two mercantile and two penny, printed in New York City from 1830 to 1842. It will use quantitative content analysis of five variables frequency, length, prominence, content, and presentation style to compare foreign news coverage between the different newspapers and over time. Contrary to expectations, the newspapers exhibited only small differences in foreign news, indicating the limitation of the dichotomous distinction between the mercantile and penny press. Rather, the newspapers showed characteristics of more nuanced market segmentation, with each newspaper fitting a particular niche of news coverage. Most importantly, this study will attempt to establish a baseline for researching the historical nature of foreign news coverage.

With an online experiment and a focus group, I examined the role of cultural appeals in online persuasive communication. The results of the study revealed that culturally oriented Web sites and online advertisements influence individual attitudes and behavioral intentions. These effects were particularly strong when cultural appeals were consistent across advertisements and their hosting Web sites. I observed the main effect of culture on persuasiveness of Web sites and advertisements both the American and the Chinese samples of participants. The results of the study did not, however, support the expectation that ethnic identity and need for cognition would interact with the effects of cultural appeals. Participants had uniform reactions across various levels of ethnic identity and need for cognition. The findings of my study suggest that online marketers and advertisers should focus not only on the message, but also on the media when targeting ethnic consumers. In fact, the cultural relevance between an advertisement and its hosting Web site is a prerequisite for a successful advertising campaign.

Media research often argues that viewing certain media can significantly increase the likelihood someone will develop an eating disorder or become obese. This study uses social cognitive and drama theory to discuss how adolescents may learn nutrition information and eating habits by watching television programs. Since adolescence is when people form eating habits, this exploratory study will analyze the nutrition content in three top teen television shows. This quantitative content analysis found that the characters in teen television primarily have a healthy body size but consume unhealthy items. This may be sending a message to adolescents that unhealthy nutrition maintains a healthy body size. Although teen television addresses eating disorders, it ignores obesity. Entertainment education (EE) case studies show the effectiveness of incorporating health content into television programs. The results of this study suggest that health organizations need to collaborate with the producers of television shows targeting adolescents to increase the prevalence of sensible eating on television. This research contributes to health communication research and studies on nutrition content on television.

This study analyzed the personal and professional networks of four local television reporters using social network analysis methodology. Network analysis was carried out to the tertiary level allowing examination of demographic data for 773 individuals in the reporter networks. Analysis was conducted through the lens of media norms and routines and the sociological principle of homophily that states people are more likely to associate with people like themselves. Using as a guide, norms and routines and homophily literature as well as studies about the portrayal of minorities, the study examines how the social networks of reporters can determine how communities of color will be covered by the media. The findings show that minority reporters who have lived in the community for an extended period of time are more likely to have the social networks that will lead to meaningful and substantive coverage of minority communities.

This exploratory study investigated the impact of endorser type and message appeal on the success of an online AIDS public service announcement (PSA). The research sought to determine the main effects and interaction effects of endorser and message appeal on the measures of PSAs effectiveness (recall, recognition, attitudinal and behavioral). In order to achieve this goal, the research conducted a 3 X 2 factorial design experiment that manipulated three types of endorsers (celebrity, expert, and typical person) and two types of message appeals (emotional and rational) in the PSA. The researcher expected the expert endorser would be more effective than other endorsers, whereas in terms of message appeal, the researcher anticipated that the rational appeal would have a significant effect on PSA effectiveness. In addition, the study expected that the PSA that used an expert and rational appeal would have more impact than other endorser-appeal combinations. The results were analyzed by conducting ANOVA analysis. The findings were not congruent to the researchers expectations. A significant effect of expert and rational appeal was not found on any of the effectiveness variables. One of the interesting findings of the study was that there was no difference between the effectiveness of emotional and rational appeal. These findings were discussed by using the information processing explained in the Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM). Based on the analysis, the research also offered practical and academic implications and suggestion for future research.

Louisianas coastal wetlands provide a habitat for diverse wildlife, recreational opportunities for Louisiana residents and tourists, and an important natural buffer between communities and powerful hurricanes. Because they are disappearing at a rapid rate, coastal wetlands issues have been prominent in south Louisiana for decades. The catastrophic hurricanes of 2005 and 2008 have given the discussion an increased sense of urgency. Through this paper, I explore coverage of wetlands loss in local south Louisiana daily newspapers. Specifically, I try to determine how these papers frame the issue and illuminate how sources present in these stories participate in the construction of those frames. I then discuss the advocacy group Americas WETLANDs role as a newspaper source, how the group developed and maintains its message, and the relationship between that message and the groups sponsors. Finally, I interview journalists who cover the issue for newspapers in south Louisiana and the managing director of Americas WETLAND.

For advertisers looking to include online media in their marketing strategies, consumer perceptions of Web sites become increasingly important. This study examined three types of endorsement in an online setting. To accommodate the many voices of a social network site, this study employed a new form of endorsement, a social-network endorsement, to account for the collective opinions and feedback of social network site members. Using an experimental design, this study tested the credibility, engagement, and interactivity of three types of endorsements: a corporate endorsement, a third-party endorsement and a social-network endorsement. Two hundred fifty-one participants examined one of three sites, a corporate site, a blog and a Facebook group page, to determine if Web site source affected credibility, engagement, interactivity, attitude toward the Web site, brand attitudes, and purchase intentions. Findings indicated consumers regard corporate Web sites with more credibility and find them more engaging and interactive. Credibility also increased positive attitudes towards the Web sites. Subjects also rated Facebook more trustworthy and engaging than the blog. However, none of the different endorsements influenced brand attitudes or purchase intentions.

This research used focus groups and usability testing to determine how a major land-grant university should design a Web site that would feature the community service work of faculty and staff, students and alumni, also referred to as stakeholders. University public relations professionals planned to launch an interactive Web site as part of the universitys sesquicentennial celebration in 2010, but had concerns that the Web site would not attract stakeholders. The research sought to answer the following questions based on uses and gratifications and impression management theories: What uses and gratifications, if any, do social networking sites provide stakeholders? Does the university create the impression of service among stakeholders? What would motivate stakeholders to visit and/or participate in an interactive Web site on university service? The research also determined whether the prototype Web site was easy to use. Findings from focus groups indicated that stakeholders did not connect community service with the university, and therefore, a Web site that features community service poses few uses and gratifications for stakeholders. Findings from usability tests found the prototype was easy to use.