Minorities and the media: a content analysis of native Canadians in the daily press*

Cette étude examine la question de l'espace consacré aux autochtones canadiens dans la presse ontarienne. Une analyse de contenu est utilisée pour examiner la fréquence des reportages sur les Amérindiens et les Inuits, les classes d'événements, la prédominance des articles, ainsi que les termes utilisés dans les manchettes. Les raportages les plus fréquents concernant les deux groupes touchaient les relations gouvernementales et les revendications territoriales, tandis que pour les Amérindiens en particulier, les reportages des conflits prédominaient. L'analyse des manchettes semble indiquer qu'un rapport existe entre l'identification des Amérindiens et les termes décrivant les conflit ou la contestation. En conclusion, il est suggéré que l'image des peuples autochtones présentée dans la presse ontarienne est liée aux relations gouvernementales et aux revendications territoriales. De futures recherches devraient pouvoir déterminer l'influence de cette image sur les attitudes de lecteurs d'appartenance majoritaire ou minoritaire.
This study is concerned with Ontario newspaper coverage of native Canadians. Content analysis is employed to examine frequency of stories about Indians and Eskimos, event categories, article prominence, and headline wording. Most frequent news categories for both were government relationships and land claims, but for Indians conflict material was most prominently located. Headline analysis indicates some association between Indian identification and conflict/deviance words. The conclusion suggests native Canadian images presented are tied to government relationships and land claim activity. Future research should assess image influence in attitudes of majority and minority readers.     

OUR NEW MONETARY STANDARD: THE MEASUREMENT AND EFFECTS OF PRICE UNCERTAINTY, 1880–1973*

U. S. annual inflation rates over the last century are analyzed in an attempt to compare price unpredictability in the recent period with that during the 1880–1915 gold standard period. The movement from negative price change autocorrelations in the earlier period to strongly positive price change autocorrelations in the recent period, is shown to imply an upward shift in the amount of long-term relative to short-term price uncertainty. Empirical evidence on the relationship between the demand for money and actual price change, on the adjustment of interest rates to price changes and on the change in the composition of new corporate debt issues is presented. Evidence suggests that only over the last decade has the public generally recognized the fundamental change from a commodity to a fiduciary standard that has occurred in the underlying monetary framework.     

INTENSIFIERS IN BEHAVIORAL FREQUENCY QUESTIONS

Intensifiers, words such as "very" and "extremely", are usedto magnify the meaning of the phrases to which they are applied.In a series of studies we investigate how intensifiers in questionstems affect response patterns in social surveys. Our researchindicates that even apparently important differences in questionwording may in some situations have little or no impact; addingan intensifier to a root did not create a response shift forseveral intensifier/root combinations in large-scale surveys.Using both field and laboratory techniques we explore the situationsin which shifts do occur and go some lengths toward describingwhy this happens. Response shifts were observed for two situations.First, when "extreme" was applied to "physical pain" there wasa substantial and significant response shift. Second, when respondentswere asked a question without an intensifier and then had thequestion repeated immediately afterward with an intensifier,a response shift was produced. In addition to the practicalsignificance for survey methodologists, these results are importantto cognitive psychologists interested in word meaning.     

SURVEY QUESTIONS ABOUT THE FREQUENCY OF VAGUELY DEFINED EVENTS: THE EFFECTS OF RESPONSE ALTERNATIVES

Experimental research has shown that the choice of responsealternatives can influence responses to questions about thefrequency of vaguely defined target events (e.g., feeling annoyed);the set of response alternatives is treated as information thatcontributes to the interpretation of the question. In a seriesof split ballot experiments we investigate whether such effectsoccur in a large-scale survey context for sets of response alternativesthat might be used interchangeably by survey researchers. Thepredicted response shifts were found in our field experiments.Those presented with response alternatives discriminating atlow frequencies reported fewer of the target episodes than thosepresented with higher-frequency response alternatives. However,the size of the observed shifts varied from zero to 13 percentand depended on a number of characteristics of the survey, forexample, the presence of "priming" questions and the orientationof the response scales. Response alternatives are not neutraland therefore must be carefully considered when constructinga survey question.     

SUBSTANCE USE ESTIMATES FROM RDD AND AREA PROBABILITY SAMPLES: IMPACT OF DIFFERENTIAL SCREENING METHODS AND UNIT NONRESPONSE

Survey mode effects linked to unit nonresponse and screeningprocedures were estimated in a study of self-reported to bacco,alcohol, and illicit drug use. Two samples of the same population were drawn: a random digit dial (RDD) sample with telephonescreening and a multistage area probability sample with in-personscreening. Respondents in both samples were interviewed by telephoneto control mode of communication effects. Households with outtelephones were excluded from both samples to control samplecoverage effects. Although results show substantially lowerresponse rates in the telephone survey due to screening refusals,the two survey procedures produced samples that were very similarin demographic characteristics and in substance use profiles.Differential screening operations and differential nonresponserates between the RDD and area probability designs did not appearto be a major source of mode effects in comparing telephoneand face-to-face surveys of substance use.