This study focuses on the identification and analysis of the three Aristotelian modes of proof (logos, ethos, pathos) incorporated into editorials written by two United States Virgin Islanders, David Hamilton Jackson and Rothschild Francis during the period 1917-1926. / After the United States purchased the Virgin Islands (St. Thomas, St. Croix and St. John), formerly the Danish West Indies, from Denmark in 1917, times continued to be turbulent and unsettled for the Islanders. Jackson and Francis, both labeled "agitators," advocated reform. Jackson in his St. Croix-based newspaper The Herald and Francis in his paper The Emancipator, published in St. Thomas, advanced arguments in favor of United States citizenship, a shift from a U.S. Navy-controlled government to a civilian one, and suffrage for the Virgin Islander. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 44-03, Section: A, page: 0609. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1983.

This study was designed to test the reliability and validity of Cushman's conceptualization of communication rules. Reliability and validity were tested by operationalizing communication rules and having subjects rate the rule for appropriateness. / Communication rules were operationalized by utilizing behaviors from Shimanoff's Communication Rules and situations constructed by the researcher. Behaviors were classified using Bale's Interaction Process Analysis. Situations were classified using Cushman's definition of interpersonal, group, organizational and mass communication. The combination of behaviors and situations produced 192 rule statements. One-hundred two subjects rated each of the rules on a seven-point semantic differential scale anchored by the adjective pair appropriate-inappropriate. / Primary data analysis for reliability were measures of internal consistency. Crombach alpha was used for combinations of items. Standard deviations were used to compare individual items. The apparent reliability of some items could be explained by the cellar and ceiling effect of the scale, therefore no conclusive reliability was established. Since no reliability was established the validity analysis was purely investigatory. / Future research should strive to reduce the ambiguity of rules and to develop a more precise scale for determining orientation toward a rule. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 44-10, Section: A, page: 2925. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1983.

This historical-critical investigation traces John F. Kennedy's 1960 presidential campaign from behind-the-scenes strategy sessions to formal speech making. The making and projecting of images are examined with focus on the methods by which an image was purposely created and conveyed to the public. Primary source material, largely from the John F. Kennedy Library, included unpublished, unedited letters, memoranda, briefing and position papers, recorded interviews, minutes of meetings, policy studies, and other types of personal and interoffice communication. / The investigation analyzes Kennedy's potential image liabilities: his age, his health, his wealth, his religion, and his lack of executive experience. How these problems were managed is explored with emphasis on Kennedy's most critical liability--his religion. The religious charges leveled against Kennedy found in periodical articles and anti-Catholic hate literature are examined. The various methods that local, state, and national organizations used to handle the "religious issue" are described. / The Community Relations Committee, an ad hoc group formed to combat the religious issue, is investigated and an assessment is made of the committee's effectiveness. Also included is an examination of the declarations and resolutions drafted by various Protestant denominations in response to the inflamed religious issue. / Kennedy's major address on religion was given to the September 12, 1960, Greater Houston Ministerial Association. The September 7 statement issued by the National Conference of Citizens for Religious Freedom acted as a chief motivating influence for Kennedy's accepting the Houston invitation. The statement, released by a group of prominent Protestant ministers, is analyzed using Kenneth Burke's dramatistic theories. Conclusions are reached regarding the impact that the declaration had nationally. / Kennedy's Houston speech and the interrogation period that followed are analyzed using Kenneth Burke's pentad as a rhetorical tool. The analysis identifies rhetorical strategies and evaluates their effectiveness. Conclusions are reached on how Kennedy and his advisers diffused and neutralized the religious factor as an acceptable campaign issue. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 44-10, Section: A, page: 2924. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1983.

Recently neurophysiologists have made significant advances toward understanding human behavior. This dissertation integrates these advances within the rubric of communication, by presenting and testing a neurophysiologically based communication model. / Three relatively autonomous processing loci, each manifesting a unique logical program, are defined; (a) the limbic system--a preconscious, nonverbal, emotional program, (b) the right hemisphere--a nonverbal, visuo-spatial, synthesizing program, and (c) the left hemisphere--a verbal, analytic, sequential program. / The method by which these loci interract is then used to explicate human behavior; i.e., the right hemisphere and limbic system are said to control behavior more as physiological arousal increases. / This model is then used to generate theories of emotion, culture, and persuasion. Emotion is currently explicated from four theoretical perspectives. By identifying the neurophysiological substrates of each theory an holistic theory of emotion is generated; eg., body feedback theory-neural tracts connecting the body with the limbic system; central neural theory-limbic system; cognition arousal theory-left hemisphere; hemispheric theory-right hemisphere. / Cultural scripts are said to exist within each locus. Thus to alter cultural norms both verbal and nonverbal persuasion must transpire (probably in that order). / Finally persuasion theories are defined as situationally guided attribution theories in which a state of physiological arousal creates belief plasticity while the experimental method dictates to type and direction of belief change. / The model is experimentally tested within a persuasion scenario. The relationship between the channel (verbal, visual) used to form, attack, and measure (verbal, behavioral) a belief is tested. Results indicate that given a visually formed belief, a visual attack is most effective when measured behaviorally while a verbal or visual attack generate equal effects when measured verbally. / Lastly, a paradigmatic shift in research focus is advocated; i.e., because the scientific method reflects only one of three logical modes it cannot hope to generate an understanding of human behavior, an holistic approach is thus advocated. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 47-05, Section: A, page: 1531. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1986.

The purpose of this study was to determine the nature of three leading American newsmagazines' image of, and related attitude toward, both the Arabs and the Israelis during the period of two years before and one year after Israel's invasion of Lebanon. / Newsweek, Time, and U.S. News and World Report were selected. News and editorials for the period June 1, 1980 through May 31, 1983 were examined and content analyzed. The period of the study was divided into twelve quarter blocks. Editorials were analyzed separately. A systematic sample was drawn from news topics and items. Every third column-inch from a random start was analyzed. The unit of analysis was the term (adjectives, nouns, verbs, adverbs). A category system was developed. Each nation constituted a major category. Nation in general, people, leaders, institution, policies/actions, economy, religion, location, and other were subcategories. Evaluative terms were used to measure the magazines' attitude; whereas evaluative and descriptive terms were used to detect the image. The author and two American graduate students coded the data. / Major findings were: (1) There was a shift, mostly negative, toward the Israelis, and a quite similar shift, somewhat positive, toward the Arabs. (2) Economy, policies/actions, and leaders were the major sub-elements hurting Israel's image. (3) Institutions, people, and extremist leaders along with their policies and actions were the principal sub-elements affecting Arab nations' image. (4) "Oil-rich" Arab countries and those involved in direct conflict with Israel received much more attention than other Arab nations. (5) Arab nations received slightly higher favorable and neutral percent evaluations than Israel in the news articles and items. The Editorials were slightly more favorable toward Israel than the Arab nations. (6) All three newsmagazines assigned both the Arabs and the Israelis more negative terms than positive or neutral ones. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 45-11, Section: A, page: 3238. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1984.

Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 40-09, Section: A, page: 4804. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1979.

Speeches of black college students were content analyzed for selected stylistic features. The purposes of the investigation were to collect normative data on the speaking styles of black college students in public speaking and to determine whether selected stylistic features of speeches of black college students at a predominantly black university were different from those of black college students at a predominantly white university. / Audiotapes were made of students presenting speeches in beginning speech classes at Florida A & M University and at Florida State University. From these speeches, 25 presented by black college students were randomly selected from the predominantly black university and 21 by black college students from the predominantly white university. Three samples selected from each of the 46 speeches were taken from the beginning, middle, and ending of the speech. These samples were coded for the following stylistic variables: word length, sentence length, segmental Type-Token Ratio, Adjective-Verb Quotient, T-unit length, main clause coordinate index, clause length, subordinate clause index, Flesch's Reading Ease Score, Flesch's Human Interest Score, nonfluencies, and black dialect syntax. / The means computed for the speeches of the black college students on the 12 variables were as follows: (1) A mean word length of 1.46 syllables per word. (2) A mean sentence length of 18.04 words per sentence. (3) A mean segmental Type-Token Ratio of .74. (4) A mean Adjective-Verb Quotient of .33. (5) A mean T-unit length of 14.86 words per T-unit. (6) A mean main clause coordinate index of 1.22 T-units per sentence. (7) A mean clause length of 9.48 words per clause. (8) A mean subordinate clause index of 1.59. (9) Flesch's Reading Ease mean score of 60.68. (10) Flesch's Human Interest mean score of 41.65. (11) A mean nonfluency index of 3.28 nonfluencies. (12) A mean black dialect syntax score of .70. / As a group, the speeches were similar to speeches of other college students on the twelve variables studied. Great variability in speaking ability existed among the black college student speakers. / A significant difference was found between the speeches of the black college students at the predominantly black university and those of the black college students at the predominantly white university on mean word length, mean sentence length, mean main clause coordinate index, and mean Flesch's Reading Ease Score. A comparison of the means of the two groups of speeches suggested a more complex speaking style for the speeches of the predominantly black university group. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 41-03, Section: A, page: 0848. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1980.

This study attempts to quantify the coverage of Nigeria and the attitudes toward that country expressed by the United States press. It also attempts to answer the question of whether the press framed the content of its Nigerian stories in terms of U.S. political and social ideals. The study is based on a content analysis of news of Nigeria published in The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, The Chicago Tribune, and The Miami Herald. / The news stories of the four newspaper were randomly sampled during the periods between October 1, 1960 and October 31, 1979. A total of 62 news stories were recorded in the four newspapers. / The measuring instrument for the study was designed: (1)To determine the amount of coverage given to Nigeria. This included comparing the news stories over time periods and comparing the coverage of Nigeria by the newspapers in terms of number of stories, trends followed, space covered, and the type of coverage. (2)To determine the attitude of the press toward Nigerian newsmakers (Was the story favorable, unfavorable, or neutral toward the referent?). Using a two stage coding procedure the stories were submitted to raters for evaluation. The raters identified the newsmakers and the direction and intensity of attitudes expressed toward them. / The following results were found: The Nigerian coverage in American papers was much higher during the Nigerian Civil War than during any other period. The New York Times printed more news stories, by far, on Nigeria and devoted more space to that country than any of the other three newspapers. / The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, and The Chicago Tribune wrote more hard news on Nigeria than The Miami Herald, but The New York Times and The Miami Herald printed more feature stories than the other papers. The four newspapers did not follow the same trend in coverage across the total time period. The similarity between the papers occured during the Civil War when they all showed an increase in their coverage of Nigeria, followed by a decline after the Civil War. / The space devoted to the Nigerian news in the four newspapers was scarcely enough to inform the American readership of significant developments in Nigeria. / The foreign newsmakers who were concerned primarily with humanitarian, economic, and political matters and Nigerian Ibos and Ibo institutions were the entities most covered in the four newspapers. / A majority of foreign individuals and institutions and some of the Nigerians who were covered in the reported events that included participation of foreign nationals were treated favorably by the four newspapers. / Nothing was repoted on United States dependence on Nigerian oil, arousing a speculation that the United States press was not sensitized to the oil problem or was not partisan in its reporting because of it. / Results show in part, that American ideals and interests sometimes seemed to influence the way the four newspapers treated and covered Nigerian affairs. But the general finding of the study was that the United States press did not always report Nigerian news in terms of its relationship to American ideals and interests. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 42-03, Section: A, page: 0911. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1981.

The purpose of this study was to examine a large normally speaking population of young black college students in order to determine the durational characteristics of speaking and reading. Further, it was the purpose of this study to make an extensive comparison of the results of Walker's (1979) study of young white college students and the results of the current investigation. / In order to accomplish the goals of this research, the exact instrumentation, method and procedure reported by Walker (1979) were employed. Normative data were reported on the five following speech durations: (1) Total speaking time which represented the total time necessary for the production of the message. (2) Articulation time which was the total speaking time exclusive of the pauses. (3) Phonation time which was the time that the vocal folds were active in the production of voice. (4) Voiceless speech which was the amount of time spent in voiceless articulation. (5) Pause time which was the amount of time in a message when no acoustic signal was present. / A total of 120 Native Black American college students served as subjects for this study. These subjects were undergraduate students enrolled at Florida A&M University and The Florida State University; 60 were males, and 60 were females. All subjects used in this study were judged to be normal with respect to speech, voice and hearing, and they had no formal voice training. / Three tasks were required of each subject. These tasks were to read a standard passage, to converse with the experimenter for three minutes and to read the written text of their conversational speech. / In addition to providing descriptive data concerning the performances of the three tasks in terms of durations, rates, percentages, and ratios for all subjects by race and sex, the following statistical tests were utilized: analysis of variance, t test, Newman-Keuls Multiple Range Test and the Pearson Product Moment Correlation. / The results indicated that there was a significant difference among the four groups of subjects for all measures except total rate of conversational speech and the reading of the conversational speech passage. The black male subjects and the white male subjects were similar on all measures. The black female subjects had the lowest rate of speaking and reading and the least pause time. The white females had the highest rate of speaking and reading and they had the greatest pause time. For all subjects, total speaking and articulation rates for conversational speech were slower than the same measures and the same material in the reading of the conversational speech sample. The total rates and the articulation rates for the reading of the conversational speech sample were significantly higher than the reading and articulation rates for the reading of the standard passage. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 42-06, Section: A, page: 2366. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1981.

Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 40-09, Section: A, page: 4801. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1979.