This essay critiques the depictions of rank and file newsworkers of the 1920s and 1930s that are offered in traditional journalism histories and in cultural, social, and women's histories of the press. Following a tradition established in the first half of the 20th century, contemporary media historians continue to reify the use of other standard…

The eugenicists of the 1920s and 1930s aggressively pursued media attention and sought policy change for their cause of improving the human race by selective breeding. Eugenics gained momentum in the United States when the American Eugenics Society (AES) was organized in 1921. Policy formation and information dissemination were central to the…

A study investigated how much attention mass communication scholars writing in "Journalism Quarterly" give to each of the mass communication industries, to what extent the various media segments are studied, and how data from diverse industry segments are used. All 1,135 articles from both the main and Research in Brief sections of…

This paper postulates that the television media in the United States is reflecting the country's culture-at-large. To be marketable, photojournalists adjust their nonverbal behavior to the cultural changes of the time. To prove the point, documentation culled from the Vanderbilt University Television News Archive is provided from the three major…

This paper examines ways in which the magnitude and critical import of the Thirteenth World Festival of Youth and Students (a week-long festival held approximately every four years, where tens of thousands of young people gather in the name of peace and friendship) was "distorted, diminished and suppressed" by coverage in the mainstream…

A study examined the mass media usage of deaf Nebraskans. Two categories were formulated to aid in selection of respondents: "experts," composed of individuals who have special training to teach deaf persons or to teach interpreters for the deaf; and "non-experts," consisting of individuals who have had no special deaf…

While not attempting to review and criticize the whole body of research of the French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu, this paper explores the applicability of his theory of culture to one of the critical theories of mass communication, namely cultural studies. The paper discusses political economy and Bourdieu's economic rationality and presents an…

An experimental study compared celebrity evaluations of a treatment group exposed to a celebrity endorsed prosocial message and a control group shown a picture of the celebrity. Subjects, 88 young adults (younger than 25 years) enrolled in an introductory communications class at a mid-size university in the northeastern United States, were…

A study investigated what kind of expectations former GDR (German Democratic Republic) journalism students have about their futures as journalists and what their general perceptions of journalism are. About 80 journalism students in their last semester at Leipzig University were administered surveys during the two days directly preceding the…

A qualitative study examined how teenagers react to and interpret certain popular media messages. In addition it explored the relationship between content containing various sexual messages and teenagers' responses to those messages, with particular attention to the critical abilities this audience exhibits. Fifty male and female teenagers aged…

This paper (1) presents observations about the major paradigms and assumptions that have historically shaped media research; (2) encapsulates the activities, thinking, and paradigms of the present; and (3) reports on a study in which 100 theoreticians and researchers were asked to respond to 50 hypothetical statements about media in the learning…

Researchers have put forth the idea that the mass media have an "agenda setting" function, that the more coverage an issue receives, the more important the public perceives that issue to be. A study tested the hypothesis that the campaign agenda presented by the media would have a stronger agenda setting effect than the aggregate media…

This paper first traces the historical development of speech compression technology, which has made it possible to alter the spoken rate of a pre-recorded message without excessive distortion. Terms used to describe techniques employed as the technology evolved are discussed, including rapid speech, rate altered speech, cut-and-spliced speech, and…

This study was designed to compare the attitudinal and lifestyle patterns of video game players with the amount of time they play, the number of games they play, and the types of video games they play, to determine whether their personal use of time and attitude toward leisure is different when playing video games. Subjects were 200 individuals…

Shows that the cultural content of Philippine print-media advertising does not reflect Philippine culture, but instead appears to reflect Western culture. (RB)