Cultural dependency has become a serious international issue over the past two decades, especially as it relates to the news media. If charges that the Latin American media are subservient to foreign interests have any truth, then the content of their media should closely resemble that of the foreign wires to which they subscribe. The news can be…

Many of the most popular books comprising the young adult literature boom--the romances--continue to fail female readers in three ways. First, some of the most frequently recommended books for young adults portray worlds that are almost exclusively masculine. Second, even the books that appear to deal fairly equally with male and female characters…

Twelve issues of Library Journal, randomly selected every other year from 1958 to 1980, were analyzed under the headings of general data, articles, text departments, book review sections, and advertisements to determine any changes such as scope, emphasis, and audience. Findings included increases in the number of pages per year during 1958 to…

A study investigated whether the workbooks used in the first grades of the Rahway, New Jersey, public schools provided adequate practice in the skills listed in that school district's reading skills array. The four workbooks analyzed were (1) "Phonics We Use: Book A," (2) "The Phonics Workbook: Book A," (3) "Programmed Reading Activities for Books…

Using the "Checklist for Evaluating Sexism in Reading," an analysis was undertaken of the Ginn 360 series and the Ginn 720 series of basal readers for sex stereotypes and related language usage. The main characters and illustrations in approximately ten stories at each reading level were analyzed. Of the 116 stories examined, 49 featured…

On the assumption that word frequency in written language as well as children's knowledge of words can provide the basis for a systematic contextual approach to reading vocabulary development, six current reading series and their workbooks (grades two through six) were analyzed for their presentation of prefixed words in context. Results of the…

The image of the Puerto Rican in 33 books written between 1950 and 1980 for young adults was examined. Nine reviewers evaluated the books for their characterization of Puerto Rican socioeconomic status, demographic status, educational attainment, family representation, and male/female roles. The negative image of the Puerto Rican that emerged from…

Three questions are addressed in this study: (1) what is the effect of additional, unexplained content on achievement and perception? (2) is the effect altered by time? and, (3) what is the relation between student achievement and student perception? It was determined that the effect on achievement was not significant but the effect on perception…

An extensive study of sexism in children's books was made based on the rationale that if society is committed to changing sexist attitudes, these changes will appear in the tools used to inculcate children. For the study, a random sample of one hundred trade books for each of two periods, 1950-53 and 1970-73, was drawn from the Library of Congress…

The formal and substantive traits of the television program, "60 Minutes" reflect characteristics manifest in Daniel Boorstin's conception of the "pseudo-event." Through both the verbal and visual imagery presented in the context of a narrative format, this television news magazine illustrates the significance of mass media…

As part of the evaluation of four different versions of a patient package insert (PPI) for diazepam (Valium) created by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the content, organization, language, and design of the PPIs were compared. One PPI was a short prose piece with clear organization that did not particularly highlight warnings or, indeed,…

The introduction of steam-powered ocean navigation in 1838 made possible the faster delivery of foreign news to United States newspaper offices and also gave rise to a new journalism genre--the transatlantic newspaper. Published on one side of the Atlantic and shipped by steamer for consumption on the other side, transatlantic newspapers compiled…

Fifty picture storybooks found on the 1979 Classroom Choices list (a compilation of children's favorite titles) were analyzed to find out what structural characteristics children preferred. A taxonomy developed by Gayle Palmer and Jadzia Nakonechny was used to categorize the books. The analysis reveals the following children's preferences: books…

A project is described which was carried out among Unesco member nations from 1971 to 1974 to investigate multilateral arrangements for the review of high school textbooks in the fields of history, geography, and social studies. Objectives of the project were to provide publishers with feedback about the potential of their textbooks to promote…

The development of instruments to measure the attainment of career education objectives in the middle grades was the objective of this study. The procedures used involved the following tasks: analysis of career education objectives by a jury of vocational and industrial arts teachers; writing test items appropriate for evaluating learning in the…