Master of Science / Department of Communications and Agricultural Education / Lauri M. Baker / The purpose of this study was to explore the frames and messages, issue salience, and communication preferences agricultural producers in Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas use and accept related to climate change and the impacts of a changing climate. It was of additional interest to explore the climate-change beliefs and preferred agricultural media sources for climate and climate change information. Specific research objectives to guide the study were RO1: describe the level of issue salience agricultural producers have related to climate change; RO2: investigate frames and messages agricultural producers prefer in reference to the scientifically designated phenomena of climate change and impacts; and RO3: identify the agricultural media and information channels agricultural producers use for climate change. Based on findings in previous research, one hypothesis was developed: H1: agricultural producers in the Southern Plains Regional Climate Hub area will be located within the audience segment groups of the concerned and the cautious as identified in the Six America’s (2012) study. An Internet survey was distributed to producers in Kansas, which was open from March 3 to March 14, 2016, with 158 responses to the survey. Agenda-Setting Theory served as the basis for the study including the tenants of issue salience and framing in relation to climate change. The study found that the majority (n = 158, 64.92%) of producers believed that climate change was occurring, however, the causes were still contested. The study identified that higher levels of risk perception and education level were linked to belief in anthropogenic climate change (ACC). Primarily, the study found that loss framing was most effective in communicating the impacts of climate change. Terminology and distance framing were less important in message framing. Regional and university publications were cited most frequently by producers as sources of climate and climate-change information and overall use of agricultural media publications was linked to higher levels of belief in ACC. Users of business reports and TV had the highest mean climate-change belief; non-users had the lowest. Audience segments aligned with cautious and concerned Six America’s (2013) audience segment group, which indicated a shift towards accepting climate change among agricultural producers.

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The theory proposed here is that the Supreme Court behaves in a strategic manner at the agenda-setting stage in order to vote sincerely on the merits. To test this, I measure the impact issue salience and ideological distance between Congress and the Supreme Court has on the agenda. The results indicate that whether the Supreme Court behaves either sincerely or strategically depends on the policy area. The strategic nature of the Supreme Court at the agenda-setting phase may be in large part why some research shows that the Court behaves sincerely when voting on the merits. By behaving strategically at the agenda-setting phase, the Court is free to vote sincerely in later parts of the judicial process.

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傳播領域的相關研究顯示，收聽/看新聞的過程與閱讀不同，閱聽人並無法藉由重複閱讀來理解新聞內容；第二外語習得的學者認為聽力理解是主動的處理過程，這個資訊處理的歷程是傳播研究收訊分析取徑自1980年代以來所關注的焦點。鑑於第二外語習得的相關研究，並未觸及新聞文本對收聽新聞的影響，本研究試圖結合基模及理解理論，來探討新聞結構及議題顯著性對閱聽人理解及記憶英語新聞的影響。 在研究方法上，本研究採用2 (正/倒寶塔結構) X 2 (高/低顯著性議題) 的二因子實驗設計，以小團體施測的方式進行，共計134名國立政治大學學生參與實驗。 研究結果顯示，閱聽人對正寶塔式及倒寶塔式的新聞結構在理解新聞的程度上有差異；議題顯著性高的新聞較議題顯著性低的新聞能增進閱聽人對新聞內容的記憶。上述發現說明了不同議題顯著性及不同結構的新聞，在閱聽人收訊的過程中會產生不同層面的影響。 最後，研究者提出研究限制與檢討，並提供建議供閱聽人收訊及英語新聞相關課程教學的參考。 / Mass commimication researchers have found that listeners, unlike readers, cannot digest news at their own pace, reread passages or check details. Listening comprehension is viewed as an active process by second language acquisition researchers. However no research has been done to clarify how listeners are affected by news genres. An experiment was conducted in which 134 National Chengchi University students were recruited as subjects and were presented with news stories in four different versions: Low salient/ pyramid, low salient/ inverted pyramid, high salient/ pyramid, and high salient/ inverted pyramid. The study found that subjects assigned to the inverted pyramid structure news condition comprehended better than those in the pyramid structure news condition. Subjects in the high salient issue condition remembered the news contents better than those in the low salient issue condition. These findings suggest that knowledge of news structure and prior information would facilitate listening comprehension.