Advancing a qualitative turn in news media trust research

The contemporary media environment represents the greatest challenge ever to journalism's legitimacy. Surveys conducted in different parts of the world highlight a decline in trust in news media. Due to the numerous changes in the news media environment, different investigative tools are required to grasp the mechanisms underlying news media trust from those adopted so far. This article provides a review of existing media trust research and argues that it is necessary to investigate news media trust (also) from a qualitative perspective because today understanding media trust is as crucial as measuring it.     

Legitimating journalistic authority under the state's shadow: a case study of the Environmental Press Awards in China

This study investigated the legitimation of journalistic authority in the form of journalism awards. The Environmental Press Awards, an unofficial but highly regarded news competition among Chinese environmental reporters, was selected as a case study. The case was examined from three interconnected dimensions: the creation and maintenance of moral and pragmatic legitimacies; the strategic processes of cognitive and social legitimation; and a dual process of symbolic legitimation of the market media ideology. Research conclusions were formed based on statistical analysis of 181 award submissions and 10 in-depth interviews with key personnel in the host organizations, the journalism community, and environmental non-governmental organizations. By looking into the establishment, dynamics, and results of the awarding process, the alliance between the market media and the green civil society was seen to have created and buttressed the legitimacy of the award. Without the blessing from the party-state, such legitimacy is vulnerable but can also be enabling.     

Agricultural Journalists' Assessments of Print Coverage of Agricultural News1

Abstract Critics of agricultural news claim farm media and mass media coverage of agriculture is systematically distorted, a condition that could seriously affect the agricultural information system. A national survey used agricultural journalists as expert judges to assess how well three types of print journalists cover agricultural news. Their assessments indicated that mass media reporters who do not regularly cover agricultural news tend to write agriculture stories that are superficial and stereotyped but not biased toward agricultural interests. Farm magazine writers' stories are not superficial or stereotyped, but writers are uncritical of agriculture, biased toward agroindustry, and overlook important social and environmental issues. Newspaper farm beat reporters are closer to farm magazine writers in not trivializing agriculture and closer to general newspaper reporters in avoiding close ties with industry. Both farmers and public thus receive biased and fragmented reporting that may polarize their views on current agricultural issues. Even if reporters are aware of critical shortcomings in their coverage, improvement may require reduction in structural constraints on story choice.     

Coverage of Marikana: war and conflict and the case for Peace Journalism

Different narratives around the Marikana massacre of August 16, 2012 have emerged in the South African news media with regard to what actually happened, what the underlying causes of the strikes were, and who is to blame. Criticism has been levelled against the mainstream news media with regard to embedded journalism, sensationalised coverage and polarisation of views and stakeholders. For this article, an analysis of news articles on Marikana published in the mainstream South African news media has been conducted. This analysis confirms many of the findings of earlier research and I argue that the form of reporting evident in these findings conforms to what has been labelled “war journalism.” I argue that the coverage of Marikana could have been improved by adopting “Peace Journalism” as a model for reporting.     

TRAUMA TRAINING AND THE REPARATIVE WORK OF JOURNALISM

This article examines discourses of trauma and affective labor in the emergence of trauma training in US journalism. In a body of training texts and films used in US journalism schools, crime and disaster journalism are being refigured as affective encounters between reporters and victims; in the process, training builds a language of trauma that describes and models the news making process as potentially reparative: as an epistemological meeting point between existing knowledge of social traumas and a training apparatus that enables constructs of trauma to do the cultural production of news differently. Rather than treat the emergence of trauma training initiatives as further evidence of the hegemony of therapeutic politics, I draw from Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick's calls for reparative critique, in which transformations in the process of news production may reveal the work of affective labor and its emotional intensities as key, but often unacknowledged, features of cultural production. Analysis of training films and manuals in these curricula, on the one hand, shows their attachments to a medical discourse of trauma that borrows language and constructs from the trauma science literature, replicating forms of referentiality between wounded bodies and traumatized psyches. However, their translation into representational practices and modes of conduct for reporters – as witnesses to others' testimonies – also pose ways of understanding the burdens and affective responsibilities professions like journalism increasingly bear for displaying and interpreting social change and political upheaval.     

How states tighten control: a field theory perspective on journalism in contemporary Crimea

This article contributes to denationalizing Bourdieu’s field theory by analysing the relationship between a regional news media field, the state and transnational influences. The article seeks to answer the question of how a state can impose limits on the autonomy of the news media field during political transition. Field theory is applied to changes that have taken place in Crimean news media since Russia’s annexation of the peninsula in 2014. Drawing on narrative interviews with journalists who worked in Crimea in 2012–17, expert interviews, and secondary sources, I demonstrate how Crimea’s news media field went from being dominated by varied Ukrainian private news media owners to becoming dominated by the Russian state. I show that states can employ direct measures such as anti‐press violence and ownership appropriation of news media outlets in order to increase concentration of state media ownership. In addition, states can reallocate capital in the news media field, disenfranchising some journalists and outlets while favouring others. The adaptive strategies of individual journalists, who, upon losing capital, can sometimes relocate or leave their jobs, also changes the composition of news media fields. Departing from a common view of social spaces as bounded within nation‐states, I examine how the news media field of Crimea has been shaped by both transnational influences, and by the direct imposition of Russian state power through a reconstitution of national borders.     

Telling your own bad news: Eliot Spitzer and a test of the stealing thunder strategy

This study explored the concept of stealing thunder, or telling your own bad news. Unlike previous research which used surveys and experiments, this study examined actual news coverage following crises that involved individuals. One case study compared media coverage of two New York governors while the second case study compared media coverage of a high profile athlete and a late night talk show host. In each of the two studies, one of the individuals in crisis stole thunder from reporters by revealing negative information before the media did; while the other person in crisis engaged in silence and allowed the media to break the story. Results indicate there may be an association between stealing thunder and the amount of news coverage one receives. Both studies found that the source who stole thunder received considerably less news coverage than the source who did not. Additionally, results from both studies showed that stealing thunder was associated with more positively framed stories and headlines and fewer negative media frames.     

Can World System Theory predict news flow on twitter? The case of government-sponsored broadcasting

Social media platforms provide world governments with the opportunity to distribute news content from their broadcast channels directly to foreign publics [Wallerstein, I. (1974). The modern world system. New York: Academic Press] World System Theory, which has successfully explained and predicted the structure of international news flow, is now being challenged. Specifically, these social platforms undermined assumptions regarding the one-way flow of information toward audiences and the exclusive institutional nature of the players in the international system. This study examines the unique case of government-sponsored news media and its international news flow. It finds that while the structure of the international news flow on Twitter exhibits a hierarchical core–periphery structure, non-institutional actors (e.g. bloggers) conformed less than institutional players (e.g. governments and news media) to that structure. This study also found that non-institutional actors assumed the role of bridging news sources and audiences, a role traditionally reserved for a small minority of elite news media. The growing and diversified pool of information mediators resulted in a more fragmented network of news flow, siloed, rather than interconnected. Research findings are synthesized and analyzed in the context of international broadcasting and social media scholarship.     

Is journalism a transnational field? Asymmetrical relations and symbolic domination in online news

Are all transnational exchanges ‘fielded’? This article explores the limits of the concept of transnational field by focusing on the case of journalism. At first glance, journalism might seem to be the perfect example of a transnational field. The frequency, speed and extent of international exchanges between media outlets has increased dramatically with the development of online news, leading media scholars to develop the concept of ‘global news’. Yet I argue that such international exchanges do not necessarily constitute a field. Using ethnographic methods, I analyse the circulation of online news between the United States and France, two countries with strikingly different journalistic traditions. Specifically, I compare two editorial partnerships between US and French websites, one linking prestigious online magazines across the Atlantic and the other connecting tabloid-oriented news sites. I find that editorial content does not circulate seamlessly between the two countries. Based on this study, the article proposes three criteria that must be met for transnational fields to exist: competition over the legitimate definition of the field, reciprocal field effects, and the existence of common stakes. More broadly, the article contributes to defining the limits of the concept of ‘transnational field’ for the study of international exchanges.     

From control to autonomy? Journalism awards and the changing journalistic profession in Taiwan

In most professional fields, award giving often symbolizes the establishment of professional standards by acknowledging and promoting exemplary practices. Theoretically, awards also serve as an important indicator of the level of professional autonomy in a specific field. In Taiwan, numerous journalism awards have been established over the last 50 years under the claim of enhancing news quality. Yet these awards do not necessarily signify a high level of journalistic autonomy in Taiwan; instead, they have become an implicit control mechanism through which the government operates to shape news production to further its political agenda. Previous studies on Taiwan's news media during the Martial Law era often focused on the restrictions imposed on the media, analyzing the oppressive methods employed by the government to undermine the freedom of the press. This study, however, examines how the government uses award giving to establish and exemplify its journalistic preferences and thus control news production. Specifically, this study reviews the history of the major journalism awards established in Taiwan since the 1950s with a focus on three aspects in each historical period: (1) the characteristics of the award organizers; (2) the objectives of establishing the awards; and (3) the genre of the winning works.     

Frankenstein journalism

Confronted with circumstances altered by the Internet, professional working practices have the option to change or to stay the same. This paper looks at how newsworkers in the new form of digital newsrooms have adapted the old location- or topic-based ‘beat’ system; now that they are called upon to curate or aggregate news stories which arrive fully formed from legacy news websites or emerge from social media. Stories like these are often valued for their virality – that is, how far and fast they have already spread – and their power to attract clicks from readers. Today, a growing number of news websites aggregate or curate such stories as part of their own news offerings. Yet curating these stories bring challenges to journalists’ identities and work practices, which demands a response. Based on an ethnographic study of eight digital newsrooms, we report how newsworkers use journalistic rituals to legitimise these second-hand stories flowing into the newsroom. We observed the use of rituals of objectivity, multiple sourcing and comparison with other news outlets as mechanisms that newsworkers used to validate and justify their use of second-hand content.     

News coverage of child sexual abuse and prevention, 2007-2009

News media coverage of child sexual abuse can help policymakers and the public understand what must be done to prevent future abuse, but coverage tends to focus on extreme cases. This article presents an analysis of newspaper coverage from 2007 to 2009 to describe how the daily news presents and frames day-to-day stories about child sexual abuse. When child sexual abuse receives news attention, the stories focus primarily on the criminal justice details of a specific incident rather than contextual information about causes of and solutions to child sexual abuse, and prevention is rarely addressed. We offer suggestions for strategies that advocates can use to help reporters improve news coverage so that it better contextualizes child sexual abuse and links it to prevention policies.     

Revisiting Impartiality: Social Media and Journalism at The BBC

This article contributes to the literature of news production studies by providing a powerful example of how processes of deliberation bring change to journalism. It explores the reconstruction of impartiality using the single case‐study of social media in the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) international journalism. In this case‐study, symbolic interactionism and mesostructure analysis enable us to explore social organizations and social processes, placing them in larger embedded contexts (structural, historical, and mode of action) and extended temporality. Following D. L. Altheide's (1996) ecology of communication framework, this study on BBC impartiality demonstrates that in the newsroom, techies have responded strategically to the logic of their environment. Techies have joined in the process of the new symbolic architecture of impartiality, which has transformed news agenda‐setting. This new logic, ushered in by techies, has shaped editorial decisions at the public broadcaster. This article discusses how social media have contributed to the nature, organization, and consequences of communication activities of the BBC.     

Journalistic right in the “first rough draft of history”: a comparative study of news copyright in the United States and the People's Republic of China

As more and more American media products enter the Chinese market, and vice versa, it is becoming increasingly important for legal scholars and journalists to understand how news products are regulated differently by the two countries' copyright policies. This article examines the issue of copyright protection for news in both China and the United States. The following research questions are discussed and answered in order to identify major conceptual and practical differences and similarities in the news copyright regimes of the two countries: How did the copyright law on news evolve? Is news copyrightable? Who owns news products? What rights do copyright owners have? How long is news work copyright protected? What are news work copyright restrictions? What if news copyright owners are foreign citizens? The article concludes by presenting and analyzing a hypothetical case involving both the Chinese and American copyright laws.     

How China’s flagship news program frames “the West”: Foreign news coverage of CCTV’s Xinwen Lianbo before and during Xi Jinping’s presidency

This study investigates how Xinwen Lianbo, a prestigious TV news program and a key propaganda tool of the Chinese Communist Party, framed a bloc of Western countries in its foreign news coverage in the period 2010-2015. The results of the content analysis performed in this study revealed that mixed and diverse images of the West were portrayed by the program. Interestingly, significantly more negative frames of these countries were identified after Xi Jinping took office in late 2012, which signaled a pivotal event in terms of China’s foreign policy. However, Xi’s speech to Chinese media workers on 19 August 2013 did not have additional effects on the program’s framing of the West.     

The Giffords shootings in Tucson: Exploring citizen-generated versus news media content in crisis management

This study expands on previously published research into the role citizen generated content plays in the coverage of crisis situations and discusses implications for public relations practitioners who must respond to this type of coverage. Using a content analysis of newspapers and the websites of cable and broadcast news networks, the authors explored the use of both official versus non-official sources and the use of citizen generated content during coverage of the January 2011 shootings in Tucson that injured Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) and 12 others, and killed six people. Results revealed reporters were more likely to use non-official sources. Reporters also were more likely to use non-official technology sources, or citizen generated content, than official technology sources such as web-based news releases and statements. This study finds additional support for the concept that crisis managers must learn to deal with reporters’ use of citizen generated content while also leveraging social media to control their organization's message during a crisis.     

Priming Implicit Racism in Television News: Visual and Verbal Limitations on Diversity

We highlight an understudied aspect of racism in television news, implicit racial cues found in the contradictions between visual and verbal messages. We compare three television news broadcasts from the first week after Hurricane Katrina to reexamine race and representation during the disaster. Drawing together insights from interdisciplinary studies of cognition and sociological theories of race and racism, we examine how different combinations of the race of reporters and news sources relate to the priming of implicit racism. We find racial cues that are consistent with stereotypes and myths about African Americans—even in broadcasts featuring black reporters—but which appear only in the context of color‐blind verbal narration. We conclude by drawing attention to the unexpected and seemingly unintended reproduction of racial ideology.     

Blogs and China correspondence: lessons about global information flows

Recent research points to the evolution of a symbiotic relationship between bloggers and the professional news media, in which blogs influence and supplement the work of journalists but do not appear to be replacing it entirely. Such relationships are developing not only on a country‐by‐country basis but also on a global scale, assisted by the phenomenon of “bridge blogs”. Will this lead to a more democratic global information order? This paper examines the China case, and the emerging relationship between blogs, bridge blogs, and foreign correspondents who cover China. It concludes that if blogs and citizen media are contributing to a more democratic global information order, it is more of a “representative” form of democracy – not a pure “many to many” global discourse that many Internet idealists had hoped.