Lars Willnat

THE GLOBAL JOURNALIST IN THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY

This study presents selected findings related to journalistic competencies or skills from surveys of more than 29,000 journalists working in 31 countries or territories, conducted between 1996 and 2011. The data come from survey studies included in Weaver and Willnats 2012 book, The Global Journalist in the 21st Century. The study focuses on aspects such as journalists age and education, working conditions, professional values or orientations, opinions about the importance of different aspects of the job, and attitudes toward new reporting skills that are necessary to cope with a multimedia news environment. The study concludes that there are no clear patterns of such competency among the journalists included in this analysis. However, tendencies were observed for some countries to have younger, less experienced, less formally educated journalists who do not highly value the interpretive or analytical role of journalism, who are less satisfied with their work, who have less freedom in their work, and who lack the multimedia skills necessary in the age of online journalism. The study also calls for systematic content analysis studies that investigate whether self-reported competencies of journalists in each nation actually correlate with the quality of the news products they create.

A Cross-cultural Test of the Spiral of Silence Theory in Singapore and the United States1

This study examines the influence of individual-level characteristics on the spiral of silence effect in two countries, Singapore and the United States, making it the first cross-cultural test of the theory and thereby addressing a gap in the literature highlighted by Schefule and Moy (International Journal of Public Opinion Research, 12, 2000, 3–28). In two identical, representative telephone polls of 668 adults conducted in Singapore and 412 adults in Washington, DC, respondents were asked to indicate how likely they would be to discuss publicly two controversial issues: interracial marriage and equal rights for homosexuals. The proposed model for predicting outspokenness adds a variety of new predictors, such as culturally influenced self-concepts, fear of isolation, and communication apprehension, along with other more traditional predictors of outspokenness, such as a persons perception of the opinion climate, media exposure, issue salience, and demographics. The findings provide partial support for the spiral of silence hypothesis in Singapore, but not in the United States. Respondents’ perception of the future opinion climate in Singapore interacted with issue salience to influence their level of outspokenness; American respondents did not exhibit such an interaction effect. In both countries, however, outspokenness was associated with respondents’ perceived importance of the issue and their communication apprehension. Media exposure was not associated with outspokenness in either country.

Priming or Framing: Media Influence on Attitudes Toward Foreign Countries

This study examines two routes for media effects on the standards by which people evaluate foreign countries. The first is indirect: a news story about an issue in a domestic context may heighten the cognitive accessibility of thoughts about the issue, thereby priming audience members to base their evaluations of foreign nations on those thoughts. The second is direct: a news story that presents a frame linking an issue to a foreign nation in a way that suggests a particular evaluative implication may shape how audience members judge that nation. An experiment revolving around media coverage of two issues and attitudes toward four nations found evidence for media influence along the second route but not the first.

Changes in U.S. Journalism

During the past decade, great changes have occurred in journalism, many of them due to the rapid rise of social media. What has happened to American journalists in the decade since the early 2000s, a time of tumultuous changes in society, economics, and technology? What impact have the many cutbacks and the dramatic growth of the internet had on US journalists’ attitudes, and behaviors—and even on the definition of who is a journalist? To answer the questions raised above, in late 2013 we conducted a national online survey of 1080 US journalists. The survey is part of the American Journalist project, which conducted similar surveys of US journalists in 1982, 1992, and 2002. We found that US journalists use social media mainly to check on what other news organizations are doing and to look for breaking news events. A majority also use social media to find ideas for stories, keep in touch with their readers and viewers, and find additional information. Thus, journalists use social media predominantly as information-gathering tools and much less to interview sources or to validate information. Our findings also indicate that most journalists consider social media to have a positive impact on their work. Of particular value, it seems, was the fact that social media make journalism more accountable to the public. However, only about a third of the journalists also think that social media have a positive influence on the journalistic profession overall. One of the most common negative perceptions was that online journalism has sacrificed accuracy for speed. Overall, then, it appears that most journalists do see the benefits of social media, but fewer are convinced that these new forms of digital communication will benefit journalistic professionalism.

The American Journalist in the Digital Age

This paper reports findings from a 2013 survey of 1080 US journalists and a 2014 survey of 1230 US citizens, focusing on their views of traditional journalism roles and the performance of journalism in the United States. The study finds significant differences in how journalists and the public evaluate news media performance and journalistic roles. It also finds that news consumption and social media use predict stronger support for traditional journalistic roles among journalists and citizens.

Priming or Framing

This study examines two routes for media effects on the standards by which people evaluate foreign countries. The first is indirect: a news story about an issue in a domestic context may heighten the cognitive accessibility of thoughts about the issue, thereby priming audience members to base their evaluations of foreign nations on those thoughts. The second is direct: a news story that presents a frame linking an issue to a foreign nation in a way that suggests a particular evaluative implication may shape how audience members judge that nation. An experiment revolving around media coverage of two issues and attitudes toward four nations found evidence for media influence along the second route but not the first.

Social Media and U.S. Journalists: Uses and perceived effects on perceived norms and values

This study, based on a representative online survey of 1080u2009US journalists conducted in 2013, analyses the demographic and organizational predictors of how journalists use social media and how they evaluate the impact of these media on their professional norms and values. The findings indicate that 9 of 10 US journalists regularly use social media in their work—but mainly to check on what other news organizations are doing and to look for breaking news events. The most frequent users of social media are younger journalists with higher incomes who work for television, radio, or online news organizations. The findings also indicate that journalists who hold more positive attitudes toward the use of social media in journalism, and those who think that social media are more important in their jobs, tend to be more supportive of the populist-mobilizer and the disseminator roles of journalism.

The American Journalist in the Digital Age: Another Look at U.S. News People

This project is based on interviews with a national probability sample of U.S. journalists to document the tremendous changes that have occurred in journalism in the 21st century. More than a decade has passed since the last comprehensive survey of U.S. journalists was carried out in 2002. This 2013 survey of U.S. journalists updates these findings with new questions about the impact of social media in the newsroom and presents a look at the data on the demographics, working conditions, and professional values of 1,080 U.S. journalists who were interviewed online in the fall of 2013.