The mass media through their power of mass persuasion have an impact on the readers’, viewers’ or listeners’ perceptions of social phenomena. This paper reports on a quantitative content analysis of articles appearing in the Los Angeles Times, New York Times, Washington Post, and Arizona Daily Star between 1972 and 1978 that dealt with the subject of undocumented (illegal) immigration from Mexico to the U.S. In this way, it is an empirical study in the sociology of knowledge that examines the social reality constructed by the news media regarding this complex social issue. We found a significant increase in the number of articles appearing each year on this topic. Relatively few were written by Spanish-surnamed individuals or used undocumented immigrants as sources of information. In fact, most of the information presented in the articles was obtained from the Border Patrol, Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), and politicians. We conclude that news media coverage of undocumented Mexican immigration was not balanced and that the American public accepted the biased information they read as an accurate reflection of social reality.

In 1990, George Gladney looked at 230 of the nation's largest dailies to see the influence of USA Today. He determined a score for each paper by looking at five categories: color; pictures and graphics; trivia and fluff; brevity, capsulization and promotion; and complexity and depth. After he determined scores for each paper, he ranked them and divided them into adopters and non-adopters. Even though two papers scored above USA Today, he found that most newspapers had a long way to go before they would look like USA Today. He also found that chain-owned papers tended more to be adopters than non-adopters.This researcher duplicated his study using 34 papers with more than 50,000 daily circulation in Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan and Ohio. Using Gladney's scoring system, the papers were given scores according to certain criteria. Some categories were further divided. The trivia and fluff category was divided into celebrity coverage, sports coverage and weather. The brevity, complexity and depth category was subdivided into text six inches or less and summaries, indices and promotions. The complexity and depth category was divided into lead sentence length and the length of the longest page 1 stories.Newspapers were divided into groups: "adopters" and "non-adopters" of the USA Today style. This study found that eight of the 34 papers were non-adopters and five were adopters.Eight papers scored above USA Today. This study showed that neither the adopter nor the non-adopter group had the majority of the newspapers. USA Today fell in between these groups making it part of the norm.There was a correlation between chain-owned newspapers and adopting the USA Today style. This study did not support Gladney's original conclusion that smallercirculation newspapers tended to be more adopting of the USA Today style. As newspaper circulations decreased, newspaper scores did not increase. Larger newspapers were not more resistant to the USA Today style. / Department of Journalism

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2000. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 305-314). Available also in a digital version from Dissertation Abstracts.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Pennsylvania, 1934. / "Planoprinting." An analysis of Negro material published in the Philadelphia record, Public ledger, Evening bulletin and Philadelphia inquirer during 1908-1932. Bibliography: p. [153]-156.

As eyewitnesses to history, American women newspaper photographers occupy ringside seats as they cover local, national or international events. Their names are credited under countless images printed in daily and weekly papers, yet viewers seldom consider how the private lives of individual women intersect with their profession. Regrettably their narratives are absent from most photographic and journalism histories. Female news photographers constitute less than 25% of this male-dominated profession. To comprehend how newsroom culture informed both professional and personal experience, extensive life histories were collected from thirty women who consented to participate in this study. As a means of painting a more complete picture of issues encountered during their careers, the group was chosen to reflect geographical location, age, ethnicities, and sexual preference. Participants were asked how they balanced career aspirations, personal relationships, and self-worth in context of the changing roles of women. What choices have they made? What compromises? Did their experiences change over decades or do some issues remain essentially the same? What kind of discrimination, if any, did they experience in their job and how did they respond? Did ethnic cultures or social mores clash with their career choice? Also explored were statements regarding education, parental professions, marital status, family dynamics, life changes, and stressors. On assignment and in the newsroom their presence has helped change social assumptions but because their profession straddles both journalism and photography, researchers have ignored much of their work. Naomi Rosenblum, author of A History of Women Photographers, cites only a few newspaper photographers and describes pictures produced by women photographers in the 1940s and 1950s as "pedestrian" in quality. Current photographic history is not false, but rather one-sided. Stories shared by the women of this study, whose collective experience spans over fifty years, offer insights to young women who will be working as news photographers in the future and refute benighted scholarly assumptions that women newspaper photographers have no history worth remembering.

This thesis is a content analysis designed to determine whether Democratic presidential candidates Gary Hart, Walter Mondale, and Jesse Jackson received equal coverage in nine selected Indiana newspapers during the month prior to the state primary in 1984. The researcher expected the candidates would receive equal coverage in Democratic, Republican, and Independent newspapers based on the findings of previous similar studies. The study was conducted using three content analysis techniques--space measurement, headline value classification, and evaluative assertion analysis. Nine papers, three from each political group, were selected at random for the study. The data collected was comprised only of news stories. In assessing whether the three candidates received equal coverage, each story relating to one or more of these men was measured using a basic space unit measurement. The amount of space received by the individual candidates in each newspaper group was converted to percentages and chi-square goodness of fit and contingency table tests were applied. Separate totals were maintained throughout for stories about individual candidates and summary stories that were about all three. Headlines concerning each candidate were accorded points based on size and placement. The resulting totals also were subjected to chi-square analysis.The evaluative assertion analysis was. conducted only on news stories that were locally generated. Two sets of coders transcribed assertions and analyzed each for the following: attitude expressed (positive or negative); strength of verbs; and associative or disassociative nature of verbs.The study showed that while the candidates were treated highly similarly by newspapers in the three groups--Hart received the highest percentage of coverage and Jackson the lowest in each case--they were not treated equally. In the individual news stories, Jackson was given significantly less coverage than the others, except in the case of Republican papers in which there was no difference. The headlines followed the same pattern. In the summary stories, there was no significant difference in the coverage received by the three, but for the headlines, Jackson again received significantly less exposure. This was most evident in the Democratic papers. These findings strongly indicate that there was bias in the nine papers in favor of Hart and Mondale and against Jackson.In the evaluative assertion analysis, the coded results all fell into a single category--most of the verbs used were strong and associative and most of the attitudes expressed were positive. This may be more indicative of the writing styles of reporters than of an editorial preference being evidenced by the newspapers.

This study sought to test on the state level the validity of Thomas A. Bailey's theory on reactions to the proposal for a League of Nations following World War I. Bailey, a noted diplomatic historian, suggested that most groups were guided by partisan loyalties to either support or oppose the League. Indiana newspaper editors were chosen as the test group for study because of their influence with the public and the accessibility of their views. Ten Indiana newspapers were surveyed fully between January 1919 and the end of March 1920, and an additional eleven papers were spot-checked during that period. The state newspapers were divided as equally as possible based upon their support for either the Democratic or the Republican party, and then were compared to two national newspapers, one Democratic and one Republican.The results of these comparisons appear to validate Bailey's hypothesis. The editorial positions of most of the Indiana newspapers coincided with the positions of thepolitical parties with which they were identified. The study also revealed greater diversity of opinion among editors of both political persuasions during the early months of 1919 as the participants at the Paris Peace Conference worked toward the first draft of the Covenant. After President Wilson presented the Treaty of Versailles to the United States Senate, partisan debate ensued, and a narrowing of editorial opinion parallel to that debate was evident among newspapers on both sides. Pro-League newspapers supported Wilson's position from the time he presented it to the Senate in July 1919. Anti-League newspapers supported Senator Henry Cabot Lodge and his followers in the Senate from about the same time. Neither group changed significantly from then until the final defeat of the treaty in March 1920. Thus, it would appear that Bailey's hypothesis regarding the partisan origins of most group's positions was correct. / Department of History

This study is essentially a descriptive account of the images of women labeled as prostitutes in the newspapers of Muncie, Indiana, at the turn of the century. In addition, attention was also given to how women as a group were presented. It was suspected that there would be a correlation between the images of women stigmatized by arrest and the images of those other women whose status or behavior was thought to merit inclusion in the newspapers.This paper includes: 1. a brief overview of the social, economic and political dynamics of the town in 1895, 1905 and 1914, 2. a section on images of the prostitute as portrayed by the newspapers during these years as well as an attempt to evaluate the actual, as opposed to symbolic, position of women identified as prostitutes and 3. a review of the activities and images of other women as presented in newspaper accounts.The main findings are: 1. In 1895, prostitutes were presented as stigmatized but integral members of the community who were routinely regulated by law enforcers while women as a group were newsworthy primarily when involved with the legal system in cases involving, marriage, divorce and suicide. 2. In 1905, the prostitute had become a symbol of individual and communal decay while women in general were portrayed within the context of romantic love whereby passion led to elopements, divorce, suicide and interpersonal violence. 3. By 1915, the image of women labeled as prostitutes had shifted again to that of a youthful victim of socioeconomic processes. This new image was linked with the much publicized ascendancy of middle-class women into the public sphere as professionals, club members and active reformers in the town. 4. Women labeled as prostitutes suffered a loss of status and legal protection between 1895and 1915 while women actively involved in public life experienced increased visibility and affirmation in the newspapers.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Flinders University, School of Humanities, Dept. of English. / Typescript (bound). Includes bibliographical references: leaves 367-368. Also available online.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Ohio University, August, 2008. / Title from PDF t.p. Includes bibliographical references.