Points out the importance of the first paragraph of a newspaper story and shows that leads may begin with such elements as the date; a person's name; a quotation; a prepositional, causal, or conditional phrase; or a descriptive sentence. (TJ)

Investigates whether ethics codes help shape the decisions journalists make in situations that raise ethical issues. Finds no evidence that ethics codes directly influence journalists' decisions. (RS)

Wiki empowers users in generating, revising, and organizing their own content. In this study, we review literature to gain theoretical support for wikis that impact learning. In a context of student journalists learning news writing, we design a two-phase field study: (1) Phase I--to examine learners' reflections on learning news writing in wiki…

Discusses the advantages for libraries of utilizing print media for public information and public relations. News releases, interest stories, and feature stories are described, and hints on writing style for each format and on getting items printed are offered. (MES)

Looks at the experiences of Richard Gilbert, reporter and assistant editor for "The Herald Telephone," a daily newspaper in Bloomington, Indiana, and discusses Gilbert's suggested guidelines for high school journalism advisers. (MS)

Discusses how weekly supermarket tabloids report and write their stories, the relationship tabloid writing has to "straight" journalistic practice, and how tabloid writers relate to such journalistic tenets as objectivity and credibility. Finds that tabloid journalism belongs on the same storytelling continuum as daily newspaper…

Remarks on the "odd" headlines relating to sex in Connecticut, noted as being the only state having a law that bans the use of contraceptives. Cites many incidences of false headlines, in which the body of the article invalidates the headline. States that examples include "92% of young men have AIDS virus"--a gross distortion…

Journalists' knowledge of news is finally reducible to their commonsensical understanding of it, which is to say that common sense is not still another way of dealing with how journalists know news but instead the very foundation on which that knowledge rests. Common sense does not simply entail some shared cognitive facility that enables people…

Journalist discusses why he became interested in journalism and how the writing of Ernie Pyle and Ernest Hemingway may serve as models for beginning writers. (DF)

Reports that the position in a news story of biasing information about a robbery suspect had little effect on judgments of the suspect's innocence or guilt. (GT)

A count of the characters in two combined groups of local and United Press International news stories suggests that the frequency ranking of the letters used most in typesetting is ETAOIN RSHLDCU, rather than the traditional ETAOIN SRHLDCU or the order reported by I. E. Fang in 1966. (GT)

Provides copyreading guidelines for the reporter, the typist, the section editor, and the copy editor; includes a chart of copyreading symbols. (GT)

Discusses how to use sidebar stories to cut down very long stories. Presents several examples of effective sidebars from school newspapers. (RS)

Finds that readers of a news report featuring extreme exemplar distortion considered carjacking a more serious problem than those who read reports featuring minimally, mildly, or substantially distorted exemplars. Finds that subjects overestimated the incidence of extreme outcome but did not differ in evaluations of newsworthiness, importance, or…

Argues for exposing journalism students to a standard stylebook like the "AP Stylebook." Notes that, besides covering aspects of style, the stylebook is a source of useful information and may stimulate worthwhile discussion as it addresses issues of "political correctness." (SR)