cartoon controversy; why the danish mohammed cartoons could be published
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The Danish ‘Mohammed Cartoon’ crisis; Classification in Hallin & Mancini’s media system; Power relations between media and politics;TRANSCRIPT
The use of sources in prominent news stories in the Netherlands
Journalism and the Media
Assignment 8: The impact of sources
October 29, 2010
Research team E: Mark Boukes, Liza de Leeuw,
Femke de Koning, Jan Peters & Yasemin Smit
Content Introduction
Research question
Hypotheses
Method
Analysis
Results
Conclusion
Limitations
References
The impact of sources 2
Introduction
Doing a research about the news industry is an open-ended and
fascinating endeavor
Looking at the use of sources is:
extremely important for the construction of news stories and its
understanding by the audience
contributes to this merely under-investigated research field
The impact of sources 3
Research Question
To what extent are there differences in the number of sources
used in prominent news stories published in the Netherlands:
in online versus offline media
(printed newspapers and television)
in national versus regional media (newspapers), and
in subscribed versus free newspapers (online and offline)?
The impact of sources 4
Hypothesis 1
In the online news environment, not just the sender but also the
medium and receiver can be construed as a source of online news
(Morris & Ogan, 1996).
Online journalists collect, annotate and comment upon sources of
news all over the web, focusing explicitly on issues and angles that
they feel the ‘mainstream’ journalists have not covered (Deuze, 2003).
H1: In online media the use of sources is higher than in offline media
The impact of sources 5
Hypothesis 2
Because of under-manned newsrooms, local journalists work in a pressurized environment where they become dependent on the pre-fabricated news from public relations organizations, or rewrites news agency copy (O’ Neill & O’ Connor, 2008, p. 489).
Local journalists rely often on a single source for stories, what is possible reflecting shortage of time and resources, combined with sources’ skills in presenting positive public images. This is a significant contributory factor to uncritical local press. (O’Neill & O’ Connor, 2008, p. 493).
H2: National newspapers use more sources than regional newspapers
The impact of sources 6
Hypothesis 3
According to the Scholten en Ruijgrok (2009):
Free newspaper articles rely for 55% on their own employees; Subscribed
newspapers rely for 83% on their own employees
Half of the free newspaper’s articles rely on press agencies
This suggests that subscribed newspapers use more direct sources than free
newspapers
H3: Free newspapers use less sources than subscribed newspapers
7The impact of sources
Method
Manual quantitative content analysis
Days of analyzing: 21, 22 and 25 October 2010
For those days the following media were analyzed:
5 national newspapers, 3 regional newspapers, 3 free newspapers
3 news broadcasts (1 public, 2 commercial)
14 news websites (online services of the media mentioned above)
Every day 10-12 news stories were coded, of which 10 or less were prominent, for a
medium per day
Resulting in almost 900 news stories (n=896)
The impact of sources 8
Analysis
Recorded in and analyzed with SPSS 15.0
One-Way ANOVA for individual effects of factors
Dependent variable: number of different sources
Independent variables: type of media outlet
Online vs. offline media (newspaper or television)
National vs. regional
Subscribed vs. free newspapers
The impact of sources 9
Results: Online vs. offline media
Less sources being uses in online media (p<0.001)
Significant less use of sources in online media (X=1.89, Sd=1.26)
compared to newspapers (X=2.74, SD=1.98) and television
(X=3.12, SD=2.31)
The difference between newspapers and television is not
significant according to Post hoc Scheffe tests
The impact of sources 10
Results: Online versus off line media
11
News programs on
television used the most
sources.
Online news media
used far less sources
The impact of sources
Results: National versus regional news media
The impact of sources 12
Sources are more used in
national media than in regional
media (p<0.001)
Results: Subscribed versus free newspapers
There was no significant difference (p=0.580) in the number of
sources used in subscribed (X=2.78, Sd=1.95) and free newspapers
(X=2.65, Sd=2.06).
The impact of sources 13
Conclusion
RQ: To what extent are there differences in the number of sources used in prominent news stories published in the Netherlands in online versus offline media (printed newspapers and television), in national versus regional media, and in subscribed versus free newspapers?
H1: rejected - there are less sources being used in online media. News programs on TV use the most (external) sources. The difference in using sources between newspapers and television is not significant.
H2: found a significant effect - national newspapers use more sources than regional newspapers.
H3: the number of sources used in subscribed and free newspapers is not significant different.
14The impact of sources
Limitations
News coverage was studied only 3 days, so a small number of
units of analysis (n), makes it hard to find significant results
Can we make generalizations from the results to:
all news stories (more or less prominent)?
news coverage of a longer period?
media in other countries?
No reliability test for the coding procedure
The impact of sources 15
References
In this research we used the following literature:
Deuze, M. (2003). The web and its journalism: Considering the consequences of
different types of news media online. New media and society, 5(2), 203-230.
Morris, M. & Ogan, C. (1996). The internet as mass medium. Journal of
Communication, 46(1), 39–50
O’ Neill, D. & O’ Connor, C. (2008). The passive journalist. How sources dominate local
news. Journalism Practice, 2(3), 487-500.
Scholten, O. & Ruijgrok, N. (2009). Bronnen in het nieuws. Nederlandse
Nieuwsmonitor.
The impact of sources 16
SPSS syntax
The SPSS syntax that has been used for this study can be found
in the notations space of this slide in the PowerPoint file.
The impact of sources 17