Showed videotapes designed to affect personal level judgments of concern and risk in context of smokeless tobacco use to 388 tenth graders, manipulating either message convincingness or perceived probability of consequences portrayed in message. Results suggest that media manipulation of probability of consequences would be more effective than…

Argues that people are affected by the pervasive images of advertisers who use signs to imbue products with specific realities. Examines how people use this information about various consumer products in making judgments of other people. (MS)

Uses a spatial model to examine the relationship between stimulus exposure, cognition, and affect. Notes that this model accounts for cognitive changes that a stimulus may acquire as a result of exposure. Concludes that the spatial model is useful for evaluating the mere exposure effect and that affective change does not require cognitive change.…

Examines effects of issue obtrusiveness on network news agenda-setting. Tests two competing models: (1) obtrusive contingency (agenda-setting effects decrease as personal experience with issues increase); and (2) cognitive-priming contingency (agenda-setting effects increase as obtrusiveness increases). Finds no support for obtrusive contingency…

Reviews the impact of technological advances on the media with which children interact and how they interact with these changes. Discusses newer and older communication media and orientations to the study of children. Suggests there is also considerable continuity despite the media changes. (KEH)

Characterizes the differences in the content of local newspaper's coverage (including political advertisements) of municipal and school board elections. Finds that local newspapers can raise consciousness of these elections and can increase voter turnout. (RS)

Analyzes the alternative media and their reporting up to the February 1986 revolution in the Philippines. Shows that they broadened the context in which key events could be interpreted, and influenced those segments of the audience that provided new leadership. (MS)

Suggests possible uses historians can make of film materials drawing on the Cooper Library (University of South Carolina) collection. Stresses the need for using outtakes to show an accurate sense of unedited history. Illustrates the value of film in understanding European fascism, and urges coordinating textbooks and film for an effective…

Analyzes the public impact of the third 1992 presidential campaign debate by measuring voters' perceptions before, during, and after the debate. Examines five hypotheses concerning the effects of debates on voters. Finds that mediated debates are affected by channel and commentary. (HB)

Describes development of an objective content analytic category scheme for measuring the sexiness of women's business attire in media presentations. Finds women's business attire in television soap operas significantly more provocative than real-world attire. Finds a significant positive correlation between the degree of sexiness as measured by…

Examines the relationship between a society's communication technology and Marshall McLuhan's concerns for human cognition, and between the technology and the ways that humans organize their societies. It is suggested that appropriate development of global electronic networks could have a positive effect on individual and organizational abilities…

Examines Richard Clark's analysis of the role of media (IR 529 139) from the perspective of an instructional designer. Clark's statements about interchangeability of media attributes, research evidence, and the influence of learner preconceptions are challenged. Suggestions for future research are provided. (Contains six references.) (KRN)

Examines whether knowledge gaps decrease when motivation to acquire information is similar among more and less educated groups. Compares two groups with differing motivations to acquire cancer and diet information in a community that received a year-long health campaign. Finds evidence of education-based differences in knowledge even among members…

Argues that a fair amount of confusion in media studies has resulted from the lack of explicit treatment of the most basic question: What are media? Suggests three underlying metaphors: media as conduits, media as languages, and media as environments. (SR)

Suggests that the reason important parts of the communication field have failed to engage developments within communications is because of a rapid march up the blind alley of cultural studies. Relates the authors' experience working with the Broadcasting Research Unit in London to suggest some of the ways in which policy and policy debates can,…