A study explored the degree to which males and females engage in social comparisons and the underlying factors that comprise and relate to social comparisons with advertising images for both boys and girls. Data were gathered from a sample of 225 females and 214 males between the ages of 15 and 18 from a midwestern high school. The same survey was…

The topic of agenda setting has been one of the most researched fields in mass communication since its introduction in 1972. M. E. McCombs and D. L. Shaw (1972) began a research collection of over 200 projects by upholding the hypothesis that the media cannot tell viewers what to think but it can tell them what to think about. The question arises…

An exploratory study examined relationships between interpersonal communication theory and public relations from 1970 to 1990. One hundred thirty-six public relations campaign cases recognized for excellence by the Public Relations Society of America were analyzed for applicability of seven interpersonal theoretical perspectives. Information…

The Media and Politics section of this collection of conference proceedings contains the following 11 papers: "Characteristics of Readers of Religious Publications for Political Information" (Judith M. Buddenbaum); "Is 'Nightline' Biased?: A Content Analysis of the Issue of Gays in the Military" (Chuck Hoy and Terry Scott);…

The Public Relations section of this collection of conference papers contains the following six papers: "Spanning the Boundaries: Support for First Amendment Rights among Public Relations Practitioners, Journalists and the Public" (Robert O. Wyatt and Sharon S. Smith); "Organizational Factors That Contribute to Practicing…

This report claims that an attack has been waged on environmental education to derail the re-authorization of the National Environmental Education Act and to de-stabilize and de-fund environmental education in the United States. Presented in the media as a grassroots movement, stories have appeared in local, state, and national media that…

The International Media section of the proceedings contains the following 13 papers: "Text and Context: A Case Study of International News Discourse" (Shujen Wang); "The Future of Public Service Broadcasting in Japan and the U.K.: A Comparative Analysis" (Roya Akhavan-Majid); "Reinventing Freedom of the Press: The Search…

Citing statistics that show that its citizens are well catered for by the mass media, this paper answers questions concerning the media landscape in the Federal Republic of Germany. The paper discusses: (1) Structure and framework conditions of the German media (a historical review of the mass media since 1945); (2) Press (including its particular…

Focusing on the federal government's efforts to educate the public to the dangers of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS), a study examined "America Responds to AIDS" public service announcements (PSA's) through a traditional rhetorical analysis (PSA characters, plot, pace, tone, and message design). Forty-four English-language…

These proceedings contain the following seven papers: "An Examination of Community Pluralism, News Framing, Source Use and Conflict of an Environmental Issue" (Cynthia-Lou Coleman and others); "The Effectiveness of 'How' Graphics and Text in Conveying Basic News Story Information" (Jeffrey L. Griffin and Robert L. Stevenson);…

Faced with a smaller pool of qualified high school graduates, American colleges and universities have been forced to adopt aggressive marketing and recruitment processes. One of the most often applied communication techniques is the production and distribution of image or recruitment videotapes, or video brochures. A study applied a content…

This paper addresses one area of conflict in decisionmaking in computer-based instruction (CBI) research: the relationship between the researcher's definition of CBI either as a medium or as an integrated system and the design of meaningful research questions. (A medium is defined here as a device for the delivery of instruction, while an…

Because the fast-growing Hispanic population of the United States has little political and economic power (a problem which has been linked to a lack of media attention to this group), a study sought to determine to what extent Miami's Spanish-language newspapers provided Hispanic angles to the l988 presidential primary. Miami's two…

A study measured attitudes towards Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) victims by providing a qualitative content analysis of newspaper coverage of the epidemic. A search of the NEXIS database was conducted to identify every "New York Times" article on the subject of AIDS in which the word "innocent" appears. Results…

Focusing on the cognitive consequences of the present-day media environment and on the possible implications for cognitive assessment of these consequences, the information environment is discussed concerning the nature of its symbol system and electronic media. Also discussed are the information processing demands of television, the media and…