Communication Technology 2007 Abstracts

Communication Technology Division (CTEC)

The Role of Animation in Targeted E-Mail Messaging at the Worksite • Betsy Aumiller, Susan B. Byrnes Health Education Center • Learning about healthy behavior is critical in an era when chronic diseases are strongly linked with personal lifestyle choices. Employers have a vested interest in pursuing educational strategies that work to improve employee health and decrease health care utilization. The use of e-mail for health promotion efforts at the worksite presents educators with the freedom to deliver messages outside the boundaries of time and location.

Effects of secondary internet use on people’s time-efficiency: Two time-diary studies on Korea and the United States • Young Min Baek, University of Pennsylvania • Previous studies on effects of internet use produced two contrasting findings – time-displacement and time-efficiency hypotheses. Some scholars supporting the time-displacement hypothesis argue that internet use drives individuals to be isolated and socially disconnected, while others holding time-efficiency hypothesis counter-argue that the internet can create more free time for interpersonal contacts because of its efficiency.

Gatekeeping: From Inception to the Internet • Michael Beam, Ohio State University • Gatekeeping theory has been actively used in communication research since its creation in the middle of the 20th century. While gatekeeping has been expanded to describe the traditional flow of news, it has been completely reconceptualized to describe the new channels through which information flows on the Internet. This paper will provide an overview of gatekeeping research on Internet technology and posit new directions for future research.

Identity and intimacy in online social networking: Qualitative study of young women’s experiences on MySpace • Denise Bortree, University of Florida • Online social networking has become a popular way for young people to maintain connections with friends both local and long distance. This paper explores the use of social networking websites by young women ages 18-21. Specifically, it asks women about activity displacement, the impact of social networking on new and existing relationships, and privacy concerns online. What emerges is the use of this communication forum for both identity and intimacy work.

Internet-Television, Peer-to-Peer Technology and Free Speech: Lessons from Web 1.0 • Mark Caramanica, University of Florida • Internet-protocol television (“IPTV”) services which stream data through a peer-to-peer (“P2P”) network architecture potentially provide for what may one day amount to limitless bandwidth for video content delivery. Such unlimited capacity is achieved through the “positive network effects” inherent in P2P file-sharing architectures. One such platform which has been the subject of recent media coverage is a platform known as “Joost.”

Predictors of the adoption of entertainment, information, communication, and transaction services on mobile phones • Jiyoung Cha and Sylvia-Chan Olmsted, University of Florida • The emergence of 3G networks introduced diverse value-added services on mobile phone. Consumers’ degree of adoption is not homogeneous depending on the service category. Using a survey method, this paper explored the factors that affect the adoption of four types of advanced services on mobile phone. Entertainment, social interaction, and instrumentality motivations predicted the intention to use entertainment, communication, and transaction services, respectively.

Factors behind frequency and duration of using social networking websites: motivations, perceptions, and privacy concerns • Jiyoung Cha, University of Florida • Social networking websites receive substantial attention from media and college students. Nevertheless, little research has been conducted with respect to the driving forces behind college students’ frequent use and time spent on social networks. Integrating uses and gratifications and the technology acceptance model, the current study found that interpersonal utility motive, perceived usefulness, ease of use, Internet experience, and age predict frequency of use of social networking sites.

Factors Affecting the Adoption Intent of VoIP Services: Focusing on Weighted Expected Improvement and SEM • Byeng-Hee Chang, Sungkyunkwan University • This study aimed to find the factors affecting the adoption intent of VoIP services. This study introduced a new concept, weighted expected improvement (WEI), and used structural equation modeling (SEM) as well as regression analysis. The regression results showed that perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, perceived social image, and weighted expected improvement affected VoIP adoption intent. The SEM results found the indirect effects of perceived ease of use and WEI on VoIP adoption intent.

Exploring the Next Frontier of Television: A Global Analysis of Issues Affecting the Development of Mobile Television • Sylvia Chan-Olmsted, University of Florida • This paper presents a comprehensive examination of the emerging mobile television from the perspectives of its converged telephone-television characteristics, diverse technological delivery mechanisms, new consumption patterns, and major industry issues such as business models, marketing, and regulatory concerns. It was found that mobility, immediacy, personalization, and interactivity make mobile television a unique and complementary medium to fixed-line television for a complete audience viewing experience.

Sharing, Connection, and Creation in the Web 2.0 Era: Profiling the Adopters of Video-Sharing and Social-Networking Sites • Hsuan-Ting Chen, University of Texas-Austin • The objective of this study was to understand users’ behavior and motivations for adopting video-sharing and social-networking Web 2.0 applications. Results from a random-sample Web-based survey of 1,055 students revealed differences between adopters and non-adopters of theses two applications when analyzed according to demographic profile, use of other Internet activities, news consumption.

Gatekeeping Journalists’ Weblogs: The Influence of Media Organizations and Individual Factors Over U.S. Journalists’ Perceived Autonomy • Hyeri Choi, University of Texas-Austin • This study explored if j-bloggers are influenced by four factors: complexity, blog ownership, size, ad-dependency. It starts from the question that even if, in general, weblogs are considered a symbol of freedom, j-bloggers might not have autonomy. Four hypotheses were delivered. Four influencing factors in this study were guided by gatekeeping theory, following the assumption that gatekeeping theory can also be applied to certain types of new media, including weblogs.

Internet Use and Political Empowerment • Jae Eun Chung, University of Southern California • Unequal access to the Internet has become a critical issue from the concern that people with low degree of access to the Internet could be left behind in enjoying greater personal empowerment from using Internet-based services. In particular, political empowerment is important to democratic processes. This study explores the predictive effect of differing degrees of Internet access and demographic characteristics of internet users on political empowerment and political information gathering.

Risk judgments of online privacy • Siyoung Chung, Hichang Cho, and Jaeshin Lee, National University of Singapore • This study examined how individuals’ judgments on risks related to online privacy (online privacy risks) were influenced by communication processes, prior experience, and self-efficacy beliefs.

Marshaling McLuhans’ “Laws” to Explicate New Media • Mike Dorsher, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire • All media follow four laws during their evolution and devolution, the Canadian father-son research team of Marshall and Eric McLuhan said in their 1988 book “Laws of Media: The New Science.” All media, they said, extend some faculty or organ of the user; close, or obsolesce, another faculty; retrieve some facets of previous media; and reverse into some unintended form when pushed to their capacity.

From Expression to Influence: Understanding the Change in Blogger Motivations over the Blogspan • Brian Eckdale, Kang Namkoong, Timothy Fung, Muzammil Hussain and Madhu Arora, University of Wisconsin-Madison, and David Perlmutter, University of Kansas • Because the majority of research on political blogs has focused on blog content (Adamic & Glance, 2004; Bichard, 2006; Jackson, 2006; Rogers, 2005), the influence of blogs (Drezner & Farrell, 2004) or blog readers (Johnson & Kaye, 2004; Kaye & Johnson, 2002), little study has been done on prominent political bloggers themselves.

The Dynamics of China’s Technical Internet Censorship System • Guangchao Feng and William Y. Lai, The University of Hong Kong • The Chinese government is concerned about its status as the world’s second largest Internet population but with priority on economic development, curbing the Internet is not so straightforward. This paper reveals that Chinese authorities use several methods to block Internet access, which are not just simply centrally-controlled, but instead use sophisticated multi-level filtering techniques. Furthermore, China’s Internet blocking mechanisms are volatile, diversified and dynamic in response to changing situations.

Does Interactivity serve the Public Interest? The Role of Political Blogs in Deliberative Democracy • Kim Garris, Jamie Guillory, Russ Manning and S. Shyam Sundar, Penn State University • Political blogs are distinguished by their heightened interactivity, allowing users to participate directly in the political process. Does the interactivity afforded by political blogs really serve the public interest by contributing to deliberative democracy? A longitudinal between-subjects experiment was conducted during the week preceding the November, 2006 elections to answer this question. Registered voters and unregistered users responded in opposite ways, with theoretical implications for the Elaboration Likelihood Model and the psychology of interactivity.

Online and Offline Activism: Communication Mediation and Political Messaging Among Blog Readers • Homero Gil de Zuniga, Aaron Veenstra, Emily Vraga, Ming Wang, Cathy DeShano and Dhavan Shah, University of Wisconsin-Madison • Political bloggers are viewed by many as lone voices, socially disconnected and working apart from the traditional mechanisms of political participation. In this paper, we seek to challenge the basis for that view by examining the ways in which the members of blog audiences engage in the political process, not just through traditional means but through new online pathways, as well.

Comparing Audiences’ Responses to Real versus Virtual Human Product Endorsers on an E-Commerce Site • Li Gong and Osei Appiah, Ohio State University • Ethnic identity is posited as a key concept for understanding the degree to which ethnic minorities embrace their ethnic membership and communicate according to group-prescribed norms and preferences.

The Mediasphere and the Blogosphere in Canada: Analysis of Content and Link Practices Among Journalist-Blogs • Abby Goodrum, Ryerson University • This paper presents preliminary results from a study exploring Canadian Journalist-Blogs. The study builds on earlier work by Bruns (2005), and Singer (2006) and provides a descriptive baseline for exploring how journalists and mainstream media outlets in Canada are utilizing the blog format. The research focuses on 43 blogs associated with mainstream news media outlets, using a content and link analysis.

Reply magnets and preferential attachment in online political discussions: A network analysis of six month of discussions in 20 political newsgroups • Itai Himelboim, University of Minnesota, Danyel Fisher, Microsoft Research, Eric Gleave, University of Washington and Marc Smith, Microsoft Research • Online discussion groups, as many other large networks, form a power-law distribution, where few participants attract large number of replies to their posts, and most people receive very little. This study aims to explore the dynamics that create this unequal distribution of replies as well as to identify social roles played by the few highly replied individuals.

Comments Discussion and the Public Sphere: A Case Study on Comments in Online News Site • Yejin Hong, University of Minnesota • This paper examined the potential of the public sphere in comments discussion. The comment section is an interactive setting in online news, which encourages participants to exchange their opinions rather than others. In order to decide the potential of the public sphere in comments, three requirements of the public sphere were regarded: the quality of messages; the direction of conversation; the process of consensus.

The Role of Trust in Interactive Communication: Antecedents and Consequences of Website Trust • Jisu Huh and Soyoen Cho, University of Minnesota • The study aims to examine the role of trust in Web users’ participation in interactive communication in a form of information sharing and identify antecedents of trust. By testing a trust model empirically with a nationally representative sample, this study found strong direct relationship between trust in websites and information sharing behavior in commercial Websites.

Choosing is Believing: How Web Gratifications and Reliance Affect Internet Credibility among Politically Interested Users • Tom Johnson, Texas Tech University • This study relied on an online survey of politically interested Web users during the 2004 presidential election to examine the degree to which people judged online information as credible. All online media were seen as only moderately credible, with blogs and online newspapers being rated higher than online broadcast and cable news. Reliance on the online source proved to be the strongest predictor of whether it was judged as credible.

Parsing out the players in the blogosphere:Developing a predictive model of blogging and blog readers • Julie Jones and John Wirtz, University of Minnesota • To date, the means of discovering the attributes of bloggers has been left to largely anecdotal observations (Gillmor, 2004; Trippi, 2004), descriptive statistics (Davis, 2005), in-depth interviews (Cohen, 2005; Kline & Burstein, 2005) and content or linguistic analysis (Herring, Scheidt, Kouper, & Wright, 2007; Nowson, 2006; Sundar, Edwards, Hu, & Stavrositu, 2007).

Impression Formation Effects in Computer-Mediated Communication and Human-Computer Interaction • Sriram Kalyanaraman, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and S. Shyam Sundar, Penn State University • In this conceptual article, we outline the importance of impression formation effects in online environments. Unlike traditional impression formation research, we identify the importance of studying impression formation effects of not just online interactants or communicators, but also impression formation effects of the technology itself.

Perceived Credibility of Online Media: A study of Social Significance, Personal Significance, and Interactivity Factors • Ji young Kim and Stephen Masiclat, Syracuse University • To study online users’ perceived credibility of the online news media, this study proposed a positive influence of the three factors (social significance, personal significance, and interactivity) on the perceived credibility of the online news media, one of the key sources for understanding online media impact. In the tests of hypotheses, two treatment effects of social significance and interactivity were reported in evaluating the credibility of online news media.

Understanding Diffusion of J-blogs: An Examination of Factors Affecting Korean Journalists’ Blog Adoption • Yonghwan Kim, University of Texas-Austin • This study was designed to investigate factors affecting journalists’ adoption of weblogs, using three theoretical frameworks: the diffusion of innovation theory, the theory of planned behavior, and the uses and gratifications approach. The results of a national survey of Korean journalists indicated that perceived characteristics, attitudes, subjective norms, perceived control and perceived needs are partially affecting j-blog adoption, while demographic profile and innovativeness did not turn out significant.

Are You Searching or Surfing? : The Effects of Searching vs. Surfing • Hyo Jung Kim, Jeesun Kim, Kevin Wise, University of Missouri • To contribute to the body of work on the role of searching vs. surfing in information processing, this study examined how these two ways of obtaining online content influence cognitive as well as emotional responses based on the theoretical framework of Elaboration Likelihood Model. A 2 (search type: searching vs. surfing) x 3 (repetition) mixed design experiment was performed.

Does the Internet add value to traditional print products? An analysis of newspaper Web sites and their relationship with the print version • Jennifer Kowalewski, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill • This study investigated how traditional newspapers used their online Web sites to reach readers. Results indicated that larger circulation newspapers added more value to their online product then smaller circulation newspapers. Newspapers with higher household penetration offered a higher level of interactivity online. Newspapers used their online product similarly especially when dealing with offering breaking news, sports and advertising. Editors used Web sites slightly differently when dealing with interactivity.

Exploring Classic Political Participation, Involvement, and Socialization through Communication Technology • Ruthann Lariscy, Kaye Sweetser and Spencer Tinkham, University of Georgia • Looking at age cohorts, this study investigates political socialization and voting behaviors in relation to political participation and involvement in classic and contemporary contexts (including use of FaceBook, MySpace). Informed by general consensus and empirical findings that a younger cohort has different beliefs about politics than their older counterparts, this study delves into the concepts of political participation and involvement.

An International Empirical Analysis of Broadband Adoption Factors • Sangwon Lee and Justin Brown, University of Florida • Broadband infrastructure is a key component of the knowledge economy. Through statistical analysis of more 70 observations, this study examines influential factors of broadband adoption. The results of this empirical study show that platform competition, local loop unbundling, broadband speed, information and communication technology use and population density contribute to global broadband adoption. This study also finds that mobile broadband is neither a complement or substitute for fixed broadband.

Perceived knowledge, emotion, and health Information use: Exploring antecedence and consequence of patients’ worry • Sun-Young Lee, Hyunseo Hwang, Robert Hawkins and Suzanne Pingree, University of Wisconsin-Madison • The Internet has emerged as an important source for people diagnosed with cancer to obtain health-related information. During the course of the illness, women diagnosed with cancer need information to make decisions about treatment and to get help in coping with the decisions they have made.

Satellite Radio Adoption Dynamics: Adopter Cognition, Technology Fluidity and Technology Cluster • Carolyn A. Lin, University of Connecticut • The subscription-based satellite radio services changed the economic fundamentals of the radio industry. To better understand the long-term economic viability of the satellite radio industry, the present study proposes to examine the satellite radio adoption process by exploring audience beliefs, perceptions, attitudes and intentions, relative to their actual adoption behavior. Data was collected via a national telephone survey of radio listeners. Study results are discussed in conjunction with implications for theory building and industry practice.

The perceived ethicality of Web sites and its implication for persuasion processes • Robert Magee, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University and Sriram Kalyanaraman, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill • Evidence was found that people can attribute ethicality to a Web site, and differential perceptions of ethicality can lead to related perceptions being realized, as well. This study also extended the scope of previous findings in the Computers Are Social Actors paradigm, which have normally not examined deeper variables, such as extent of persuasion.

Customization vs. Personalization: The Role of Power Usage and Privacy • Sampada Marathe, S. Shyam Sundar and Christen Reese, Penn State University • This paper attempts to explain why power users prefer content that they customize themselves while low-end users would like it when the system personalizes content for them. It experimentally demonstrates that this interaction between self vs. system tailoring and power-usage occurs only under conditions of low privacy. It also explores other theoretical mechanisms via mediators such as self-efficacy, sense of control, convenience, and utility, with implications for theory and design of tailoring sites and systems.

Collective Identity on hate group Web sites • Michael McCluskey and Heather LaMarre, Ohio State University • Hate group Web sites communicate a collective identity to potential members. Analysis of 911 text articles on 28 hate group Web sites showed two elements of collective identity, justification and victimization, varied by target and group type. Material contained highest justification when foreign government and integration were targets, and among Neo-Nazi groups. Highest victimization occurred when Jews and U.S. government were targets, and among Skinhead groups.

Mobile Phone Text Messaging Overuse among Developing World University Students • Stephen Perry, Illinois State University • Mobile phone text messaging often is more affordable than voice messaging in the developing world. Its similarity to instant messaging and other Internet synchronous communication technologies suggests that overuse and addiction-like tendencies might be found among users as has been identified with these similar technology applications. Symptoms related to components of addiction diagnoses were found to be prevalent among 214 respondents to a survey, all of whom were completed questionnaires at the University of Mauritius.

Weight loss blogs: An analysis of their potential as adjuncts to women’s dieting efforts • Paula Rausch, University of Florida • This study sought to fill gaps in existing literature by examining weight loss blogs through qualitative grounded theory techniques to determine what they mean to the women who write and how they fit in to their weight loss endeavors. These meanings fell into six broad themes: expression and reflection, connection, balance, struggle, control, and fear. A theoretical model was developed showing how weight loss blogs may hold potential for breaking resistant weight loss-gain patterns.

Using the Internet for Specialized In-depth Information • Daniel Riffe, Ohio University, Steve Lacy and Miron Varouhakis, Michigan State University • This national survey found that the Internet is a valued source of in-depth information about health, science, and business. Between 31% and 50% of the respondents said they use the Internet weekly for in-depth information in one of the three areas. Background variables predicted whether people use the Internet for such information better than they predicted people’s evaluation of that information’s quality. The results suggest researchers should study the functions of in-depth specialized online information.

Chronicling the Chaos: Tracking the news story of Hurricane Katrina from The Times-Picayune to cyberspace • Susan Robinson, University of Wisconsin-Madison • The extraordinary breaking news story of Hurricane Katrina offered an opportunity to document how multimedia and interactive features interfere with the carefully crafted news story of a newspaper. This textual analysis of the case study was informed by press and medium scholarship. The main finding was that the newspaper tale of a mythic Flood in an American city transformed into a chronicle about people’s personal experiences in cyberspace.

What’s on Wikipedia, and What’s Not? Completeness of Information on the Online Collaborative Encyclopedia • Cindy Royal and Deepina Kapila, Texas State University at San Marcos • The World Wide Web continues to grow closer to achieving the vision of becoming the repository of all human knowledge. While improved search engines such as Google facilitate access of knowledge across the Web, some sites have increased in popularity and have attracted the attention of more Web users than others. Wikipedia is one such site that is becoming an important resource for news and information.

From Have Nots to Watch Dogs: Understanding the Realities of Senior Citizens’ Use of the Internet for Health Information • Sally J. McMillan and Avery Johnson, University of Tennessee-Knoxville and Wendy Macias, University of Georgia • Senior citizens are often positioned as “have nots” in the digital age, but many use the internet for health information. This study uses grounded theory to explore online health communication among older Americans. Open-ended survey responses from 424 internet users age 55+ were analyzed. Selective coding categories were: empowerment, personal and professional communities, and watchdogs and peer assumptions. These themes are discussed in the context of health communication literature with suggestions for future research.

Innovation or Normalization in E-Campaigning? A Longitudinal Content and Structure Analysis of German Party Web Sites in the 2002 and 2005 National Elections • Eva Johanna Schweitzer, University of Mainz • The paper explores the innovation and normalization hypothesis of e-campaigning by a longitudinal content and structure analysis of German party Web sites in the 2002 and 2005 National Elections. The comparison of the formal home page appearance and its argumentative stance provides support for a partial innovation process: The Web sites became more information rich, more interactive, and more sophisticated. On the content level, though, traditional offline strategies, such as metacommunication or negative campaigning, prevailed.

The U.S. Transition to Digital Television: The Final Steps • Pete Seel, Colorado State University • On February 17, 2009 the nation’s television broadcasters will turn off their analog transmitters. The final stage of the transition to digital television will affect five primary groups: broadcasters, the federal government, television manufacturers, multi-channel video program distributors, and consumers. This paper analyzes the preparedness of these groups for the transition and questions if federal plans to assure universal access to the new digital television format are workable.

VOIP-telephone service: Economic efficiencies and policy implications • Sangho Seo, Konkuk University • The primary purpose of this study is to estimate, empirically, the economic efficiency of voice-over-Internet-protocol (VOIP) technology and discuss how the emergence of VOIP technology is effective in leading to additional competition in U.S. local telecommunications markets.

Perceived Credibility of Job Search Sites and Users’ Intention to Post Resume • Wonsun Shin, University of Minnesota • This study investigated how perceived credibility was related to persuasion in two job search websites. Results showed that perceived credibility was positively related to users’ intention to post their resume on the website they visited. Observable credibility cues played more important roles for those who were less familiar with the websites in their decision to post or not to post resume, while reputation and quality attributes did not work differently by website familiarity.

The Interconnected Web: Media Consolidation, Corporate Ownership, and the World Wide Web • Charlene Simmons, University of Tennessee-Chattanooga • Has the Internet become a democratic medium and source of alternative information, like some hoped? Or is the Internet, like other mass media, controlled by large media corporations? This study explores this question by examining the entities behind the most popular Web brands. In the end, the article finds that the most frequented portion of the Web is controlled by commercial corporations and does not appear to serve as an alternative to traditional media sources.

If You Build It, Will They Come? Blogs in the Journalism and Mass Communication Curriculum • Jane B. Singer, University of Central Lancashire/University of Iowa • Despite the spread of blogs in the media and in academia, little scholarly work has explored their use within the journalism and mass communication curriculum. This study, based on incorporation of blogs in 10 classes over five semesters, examines student use of the format in relation to theories of social and blended learning. The findings suggest that although students tend to approach blogging as yet another assignment, their engagement in online conversation offers pedagogical benefits.

Predicting iPod Implementation: Use and Impact of an iPod • Tang Tang, Ohio University • This survey study was designed to examine the iPod usage and impacts. The findings of this study suggested that the iPod usage was influenced by motivations, availability, accessibility, user activities, alternative media behavior, and attitudes toward use. Among all the factors, attitudes toward use was the strongest predictor of the iPod usage, followed by audience availability and the cost an iPod user spent on purchasing music, media files, and accessories for the iPod.

From Product to Service: Dynamic Content in Online Newspapers • Mark Tremayne, Amy Schmitz Weiss and Rosental Alves, University of Texas-Austin • Our study documents a steady increase in dynamic journalism on the websites of 24 U.S. newspapers, including a sharp rise in 2006 of multimedia elements, particularly video. This trend was apparent for smaller newspapers as well as large. While traditional news categories are the most common source of dynamic content, the growth is coming from coverage of weather, sports, crime and accidents. There also appears to be a rise in softer news.

Frames and Opinion in the Blogosphere: Testing Attitude Constraint in Political Blog Readers • Aaron Veenstra, Rosalyna Wijaya, Emily Acosta and Muzammil Hussain, University of Wisconsin-Madison • As blog readership increases, the question of how political blog readers differ from non-readers becomes more important to fully understanding the landscape of political attitude formation. Most extant research on blogs fails to address this question in some fundamental way – focusing on non-political blogs, focusing on bloggers rather than readers, or failing to separate blog readership from other types of Internet use.

Behind Closed Doors: China’s Internet Censorship and Its Implications on the Blogosphere • Shao-Jung Wang and Junhao Hong, University of Buffalo • This paper investigates the implications of regulation in China’s blogosphere and the extent to which it impacts bloggers from both a social and a cultural context. The abundant diary-style blogs and bloggers’ limited interest in politics demonstrate a new cultural phenomenon that obscures the impact of censorship on blogging. However, cyberspace creates the structure of surveillance environment, concentrated power and sustained inequality. China’s blogosphere has relatively little value as a medium for organized free speech.

The Digital Divide and the Knowledge Gap • Lu Wei and Douglas Hindman, Washington State University • Based on a national survey, it has been found that (1) the informational use of the Internet is more important than the access to the Internet in predicting political knowledge, (2) socio-economic status is more strongly associated with the informational use of the Internet than with that of the traditional media, and (3) the usage gap of the Internet is associated with a greater knowledge gap than is the usage gap of traditional media.

“Why do you read blogs and update your facebook page so much?”: Using psychological variables to predict specific Internet behaviors • John Wirtz and Julie Jones, University of Minnesota • The current study presents the results of an analysis of the relationship between four psychological variables-need for cognition (NFC), social comparison orientation (SCO), sensation seeking (SS), and need for uniqueness (NFU)-and three popular Internet behaviors. NFC explained variation in blog reading but not blogging or updates to myspace/facebook pages, while SCO explained variation in all three activities.

Breaking News on the Web: Top Story Life and News Topic and Type • Jin Xu, Winona State University • This research examines the relationship between the life and update of the online news top story and news topic and type. The research sample consists of the real-time updates to CNN.com’s top stories in nine randomly selected 72-hour periods. The findings show that the degree of timeliness is determined, to a large extent, by the topic and type of the top stories. The implications of the findings and further directions of this research are discussed.

Online Consumer Trust in the Context of Internet Experience-Exploring Antecedents and Consequences • Liuning Zhou, University of Southern California • Past studies have looked for determinants of online consumer trust in variables internal to the online shopping process or trusting disposition of online shoppers. It is a strategy for conceptual and empirical convenience. This study puts online consumer trust in the context of Internet experience, and examines variables external to the online transaction process. Results from a national random sample show that Internet ability and Internet perception have a significant impact on online consumer trust.

<< 2007 Abstracts

Advertising 2007 Abstracts

Advertising Division

Research
Motivation Crowding: The Hidden Costs of Introducing an Incentive in Advertising to Promote Intrinsic Behavior • George Anghelcev, University of Minnesota and John Eighmey, University of Minnesota • Common sense suggests that the offer of an incentive, such as a rebate or another promotional offer, should increase people’s willingness to perform a certain behavior. Indeed, incentives are often placed in advertising to increase the speed and extent of consumer response. But, do incentives always work in an additive manner to increase the motivation to respond to advertising? Or, are there circumstances in which incentives reduce the motivation to respond?

“Look Mom! Can I get that toy?”: Parental Concern Regarding the Impact of Television Advertising on Pre-School Children • Shannon Bichard, Maria Fontenot, Kent Wilkinson and Alex Ortiz, Texas Tech University • Many have debated the impact of television on young children as well as issues of responsibility. Specifically, advertising aimed at young children has been addressed as a cause for concern. The current study attempts to reveal perceptions of advertising influence from a unique perspective – parents of pre-school aged children belonging to two cultural groups: Anglos and Hispanics.

‘Ad Nauseum’ Hits Nebraska: Analysis of 2006 Television Ads for U.S. House and Senate Candidates • Ruth Brown and Kyle Petersen, University of Nebraska at Kearney • This research analyzed all of the television advertisements uploaded to the websites of candidates for three U.S. House and one U.S. Senate seat in Nebraska in 2006. Verbal and nonverbal content plus cinematography techniques were studied to determine if they followed national trends or blazed new trails that could be followed by future campaigns in conservative states. Results showed that the candidates’ ads followed some trends but also carved some niches all their own.

Cultivation effects of television advertising: An urban rural comparison • Xiao Cai, Wei Fang and Kara Chan, Hong Kong Baptist University • A survey was conducted to examine the cultivation effects of television advertising on the belief about the prevalence of affluence in society and the materialistic value orientation among adolescents in urban and rural China. Altogether 792 adolescents aged 11 to 17 in a rural county in Henan province and in Guangzhou city were surveyed in October to December 2006.

Is That Website for Me? An Affect/Pleasure-as-Information Model of Self-Website Image Congruency Effects • Chingching Chang, National Chengchi University • This study explores the idea that the visual design of a website can convey a brand and/or corporate image. It is proposed that, because of the ability of self-concepts to regulate affect, congruency between a website’s projected image and a consumer self-concept will produce positive emotional responses and hedonic pleasure.

Consumer Attitudes towards Product Placement: Implications for Public Policy • Federico de Gregorio, University of Alabama, Yongjun Sung, University of Texas-Austin and Jong-Hyuok Jung, University of Texas at Austin • As a form of covert marketing communication tool, the practice of placing branded products within films for commercial purposes has gained popularity among marketers and brand managers. At the same time, the popularity of this practice increases concerns and discussions of public well-being from various groups such as public policy makers, consumer interest groups, regulatory agencies, and consumers.

Influence of Appeal Type in Direct Mail: How Inducing Feelings of Gratitude and Obligation Affects Consumer Response • Sara Dodd, Natalia Kolyesnikova and Coy Callison, Texas Tech University • Gratitude and obligation are identified as two affective responses that have received minimal treatment by social scientists and virtually no consideration in advertising research. Participants (N = 120) were exposed to advertising copy text in mock postcards sent from a hypothetical winery to its visitors. Results indicated exposure to gratitude messages translated positively to consumers’ purchase intents and attitudes toward the company. Exposure to obligation messages, on the other hand, had less positive influences.

Excellent Account Planning: What Award Winning Planning Cases Tell Us about Planning’s Utility in Advertising • Eric Haley, Margaret Morrison and Ronald Taylor, University of Tennessee • This study investigated three years of the Jay Chiat Planning Awards given for excellence in account planning. Among measures, case studies were analyzed with an interpretive approach to identify the 1) problem; 2) types of research used to solve the problem 3) solution orientation and target market; 4) insight; 5) goal of advertising; 6) creative strategy; 7) media used; 8) media, public relations and sales promotion implications; and, 8) results.

Appeals and Physician Portrayals in Cosmetic Surgery Magazine Advertisements from 1985 to 2004 • Heidi Hennink-Kaminski, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill • Although increased marketing activity has contributed to the rise in cosmetic surgery, little is known about the content of advertising messages. This study examines physical properties, appeals, and portrayals of physicians in cosmetic surgery advertisements in city magazines for four markets from 1985-2004 and finds that promotional activity has increased significantly over time, that most ads continue to use rational vs. emotional appeals, and that physicians credentials play a central role in such ads.

Physician Perceptions of Third-, Second-, and First-Person Effects of DTC Prescription Drug Advertising on the Physician-Patient Interaction • Jisu Huh, University of Minnesota • This study, using the DTC advertising phenomenon as a context, examined three types of person-effects of DTCA among physicians, and explored how and what types of personal background and experience factors might determine first-person, second-person, or third-person effect perceptions. Behavioral implications of different person-effect perceptions were also investigated.

Understanding the Effectiveness of Product Placement: The Role of Placement Congruency and Information Processing • Kavita Jayaraman, Jing Zhang • This project examined the influence of placement congruency and information processing on the effectiveness of product placement in a TV sitcom. In an experiment, we found that compared to an incongruently placed product, a congruently placed product elicited lower level of product recall, but more favorable product attitudes among respondents. Moreover, this attitudinal effect was more pronounced when the respondents engaged in incidental (vs. deliberate) information processing when they watched the TV program.

Effects of multitasking and arousal on television advertising recall • Se-Hoon Jeong, University of Pennsylvania, Weiyu Zhang and Martin Fishbein • Audiences frequently engage in multitasking that is using media while doing something else (e.g., work). The present experiment examined young audiences’ recall of advertising content as a function of a) multitasking (watching television while doing homework) and b) arousal due to sexual content in television programming. Results suggest that multitasking tends to reduce audiences’ recall of advertisements, and there is an interaction between multitasking and degree of sexual content.

Attitudes toward Advertising in General: A Re-Inquiry • Hyun Seung Jin, Kansas State University • This paper investigates attitudes toward advertising in general. We argue in this paper that laypeople perceive some types (examples) of advertising as more typical (more likely advertising) and others as less typical (less likely advertising). A Promotional Activity Profile was developed and used to measure the typicality in advertising. Perceived typicality in a person’s mind, in turn, can affect attitudes toward advertising in general.

The Role of Affect and Cognition in Consumer Evaluation of Corporate Visual Identity • Jong Woo Jun and Chang-Hoan Cho, University of Florida and Hyuck Joon Kwon, Hankuk University of Foreign Studies • This study investigates the role of affect and cognition in shaping attitudes toward the Corporate Identity Logo. The findings suggest that both affective and cognitive components of CVI exert significant influences on consumer attitudes toward the CI logo, which in turn, leads to company attitudes and subsequently to purchase intention. Cultural differences were also detected in consumer CI evaluation: affect was more important for the American while cognition was more significant for the Korean subjects.

An Exploratory Content Analysis of Online Gambling Advertising on TV: The Trojan Horse Strategy • Jong-Hyuok Jung, Yoojung Kim, Wei-Na Lee, The University of Texas at Austin and David J. Lyon • This study explored the amount and characteristics of online gambling advertising on television to obtain a better understanding of the current state of online gambling advertising in the U.S. To achieve this goal, a content analysis of televised poker program advertising of five networks (i.e., ESPN, ESPN2, GSN, FSN, and Travel Channel) was carried out.

Viewing Television Programs and Commericals in a Public Setting • Hana Kim, Wesley Burnett, Lenette Golding and Dean Krugman, University of Georgia • This study examines television viewing behavior in public settings. Eyes on screen measures and field notes were used to examine attentiveness to both commercials and programming during the 2006 NCAA basketball tournament. Results reveal that on average respondents had their eyes on screen 29% of the time during commercials and 51% of their time during the programming. Findings for commercial viewing are close to previous studies using similar techniques for in-home viewing.

A Frontier Analysis for Advertising Budget Decisions • Kihan Kim and Yunjae Cheong, University of Texas at Austin • In an attempt to help marketers set and allocate advertising and promotion budget, we developed efficient frontier among the 38 global firms using DEA methodology. Seven input variables, including six breakdowns of advertising media spending and the total promotion dollars, and two output variables, corporate revenue and reputation, were analyzed.

Value Congruency Effects of Advertising on Attitude and Behavioral Intentions • Sora Kim and Eric Haley, University of Tennessee-Knoxville • This study intends to explore how people’s different personal and business values could influence their attitudes and behavioral intentions toward product and corporate advertising. Our study found a significant value congruency effect for both product and corporate ads. High value congruency groups showed more favorable attitudes and behavioral intentions toward the ads and brands advertised than low value congruency groups for both personal and business values.

Agenda Setting Effects of Public Service Advertising: An Experiment • Joongrok Kwon and Jack Powers, Ithaca College • This study is aimed at testing the agenda-setting effects of public service advertisements on children. It employs an experimental approach, using a number of alternative stimuli. This study concentrates particularly on the dimensions of a recipient’s attention level, recall, level of interest and importance of the exposed PSA theme, plus behavioral intention.

Global brands without ads? Insights into Starbucks’ customer satisfaction • En-Ying Lin and Marilyn Roberts, University of Florida • Starbucks dominates global coffee consumption by capturing customers’ attention and commingling with their lifestyles without large sums of mass mediated advertising. The study uses survey methodology to examine the opinions from 400 of Starbucks’ customers living in Taipei. The findings suggest that conducting business and making them feel distinctive are keys to high satisfaction. These findings contrast with two important prediction variables for general customer satisfaction levels.

I see what you don’t see. The Role of Individual Differences in Field Dependence-Independence as a Predictor of Product Placement Recall • Joerg Matthes, Christian Schemer, Werner Wirth and Anna-Katerina Kissling, University of Zurich • Individual differences in the cognitive trait of field dependence-independence are an integral factor for the perception of product placements. The reason is that field independent individuals are better able to separate a stimulus from its embedding context; thus, they can more easily recognize a placement in a complex audiovisual field. The results of an experiment demonstrate that field independent individuals score higher on recall measures than field dependent individuals.

Putting to Death the Talk of the Death of the 30-Second Commercial • Michael Maynard, Temple University and Alison Carey, American Board of Internal Medicine • More than a few industry analysts have predicted the death of the 30-second commercial due to the arrival of DVR and its time-shifting technology. All the talk has encouraged most advertising executives to seek replacements for the advertising unit they hear has lost its force. This paper seeks to put to death this claim and argues, instead, that the DVR actually adds life, not death, to the 30-second television commercial.

Pets in Print Advertising–Are We Really Seeing More of Rover and Fluffy? • Charles Mayo, Kennesaw State University, Donna Mayo and Marilyn Helms, Dalton State College • This content analysis of advertising in four popular magazines investigates whether the role of pets—specifically dogs and cats—has changed as they have grown in popularity and power in American culture. Analysis of print ads in 1994 and 2004 suggests that although the frequency with which household pets appear in print ads has declined slightly, portrayals of “Rover” and “Fluffy” have changed to reflect society’s growing fascination with and devotion to our furry family members.

The Third-person Effect and Its Influence on Perceptual and Behavioral Outcomes: In a Cosmeceutical Product Advertising Context • Juan Meng, Williams Gonzenbach and Federico de Gregorio, University of Alabama • By using a 2 X 2 factorial design, this experiment investigated cosmeceutical product advertising and product-related news coverage within the third-person effect framework. As predicted, respondents perceived cosmeceutical product advertising and news to exert greater influence on others than on themselves. More significantly, the findings showed that both perceptual differences and behavioral intentions varied according to respondents’ levels of self body-esteem.

Mechanisms of Consumer Responses toward Unsolicited Commercial E-mail • Mariko Morimoto, University of Georgia and Susan Chang, University of Miami • Using the survey method, this study investigates how consumers regard unsolicited commercial e-mail (spam) and advertisers using this communication method. Specifically, the study closely examines the potential effect of psychological reactance on consumer perceptions towards spam and the process of attitude formation.

To Buy or Not To Buy: Socially Responsible Consumer Behavior and Implications for Advertisers • Hye-Jin Paek, University of Georgia and Michelle Nelson, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign • We identify characteristics of the two types of socially responsible consumers (boycotters and boycotters) and examine how they think about big business, brand values, advertising, and advertising ethics. Our analysis of 2004-2005 national consumer panel data reveals that SRCs share personal traits and support restricting unethical advertising. But consumers who engage in these SRCBs show dissimilar levels of belief in brand values and cynicism about big business and advertising.

“Real” Beauty and the Dove Campaign: The Role of the Thin-Ideal Media in Cultivating Notions of Ideal Beauty and Thinness in Women • Amy Rask and Kimberly Bissell, University of Alabama • Using an experiment with college women at a university in the south, we used an image of a model from Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty with other lingerie and swimsuit models of varying shapes and sizes to test how or if the campaign’s objective of teaching women that beauty comes in all shapes and sizes was at all successful in changing college women’s beliefs about beauty and attractiveness in themselves and in other women.

The Effects of Moods on Evaluations of Brand Extension Ads • Sela Sar, Iowa State University and Brittany R.L. Duff, University of Minnesota • Two experiments were conducted to examine the effects of mood on consumers’ evaluations of brand extensions. Consumers in a positive and a negative mood were asked to evaluate brand extensions by judging how well they fit with the parent brand. The results revealed that consumers in a positive mood perceived higher brand extension fit and evaluated brand extensions more favorably than did consumers in a negative mood. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Understanding the Joint Effects of Information Valence and Network Structure on Electronic Word-of-Mouth Intention • Dongyoung Sohn, University of South Florida • Consumer electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM) is a dual-edged sword for companies: Positive eWOM about products and companies may be the most powerful form of advertising, while negative eWOM may be a nightmare.

Revenues, Pressures, Managers: Advertiser Influence on Local TV News • Jim Upshaw, University of Oregon, Gennadiy Chernov, University of Regina (Saskatchewan, Canada) and David Koranda, University of Oregon • This paper reports on a study of commercial influence on news content in a nationwide sample of network-affiliated television stations in 2004. Results showed more “stealth advertising” at the end of a quarter (March) than at the start of the next quarter (April). Sales figures suggest that favorable treatment of advertisers at the end of a quarter may lead soon to revenue growth. Manager interviews indicate pressures to place financial sustainability above journalistic independence.

Cross-channel integration of advertising: Does personal involvement matter? • Alex Wang, University of Connecticut-Stamford • This study examined the effect of cross-channel integration of an advertiser’s television spot that invited viewers to play an online game and website that featured the game on viewers’ perceived media engagement, brand attitudes, and behavioral intentions. A moderating factor, personal involvement, was also tested. The results revealed that interaction effects were evident between cross-channel integration and personal involvement on media engagement and brand attitudes. Implications and directions for future research were discussed.

An Exploratory Study of Infomercial Clearance on High Reach Cable Channels: Could Deceptive Infomercial Advertisers Be Targeting Elderly, Less Educated or Lower Income Viewers? • Jan Wicks, University of Arkansas, Robert Brady, Stacey Effrig and Katherine Widder • The billion dollar infomercial industry reaches millions of U.S. consumers annually. While most infomercials are legitimate, this study examines the deceptive infomercials that aired on seven high reach cable channels throughout 2001. The results suggest cable channels earning lower profits air more deceptive infomercials and lower income, less educated and elderly viewers may be exposed frequently to them. Suggestions are made to improve consumer protection by requiring advertisers and media outlets to be more proactive.

Marie Claire in Five Flavors: A Look at Transnational Advertising • Margaret Young and Sara Netzley, Bradley University • To explore whether globalization leads to homogenized advertising messages across cultures, this study examined advertisements in Marie Claire issues from five countries. It found that the majority of advertisements were for internationally marketed products, and that contrary to past research findings, advertisements in Western issues were no more sexual than advertisements in Asian issues, and Western models were not depicted as sexier than Asian models.

Teaching
Advertising Education in the New Millennium: A Survey of Faculty • Stephen Banning and John Schweitzer, Bradley University • Advertising education has faced major changes in recent years with media and methods undergoing tectonic shifts. While the changes are well documented, the state of advertising education has not been seriously surveyed for over a decade. This study surveyed advertising educators’ opinions on a variety of topics related to advertising education. Results indicate educators are aware of technological and other changes.

Assessing Student Learning Outcomes in the Advertising Campaigns Course: What Do Students Learn and How Can We Measure It? • Frauke Hachtmann, Nancy Mitchell and Linda Shipley, University of Nebraska-Lincoln • This paper investigates how educators can develop a sustainable plan to measure student learning in the campaigns course as an appropriate starting point for program assessment. The authors developed an assessment model for teaching and learning and used it in a mixed methods study to explore the differences between grading and learning, which led to course improvement. Students listed skills related to professional, interpersonal, and personal development as primary learning outcomes of the campaigns course.

Advertising Educators’ Advice About Guest Speakers: Making the Most of Visits by Ad Professionals • Eric Haley and Robyn Blakeman, University of Tennessee-Knoxville • The purpose of this study is to evaluate the guest speaker experience. Bringing professional speakers into the classroom or to an extra-curricular activity should be an educational and personalized experience for students, faculty and speaker alike. Preparation and interaction between faculty and speaker beforehand can make the experience a positive one. However, speakers who have their own agenda can initiate negative feelings in students about a program, the profession, and the speaker’s agency.

PF&R
Pizza, Beer and Multiculturalism? A Content Analysis of Super Bowl Ads 1996-2005 • Ruth Brown, University of Nebraska at Kearney and Kathryn Bodenhamer • Research found that African-Americans accounted for the largest percentage of minorities shown in Super Bowl ads; Hispanic-Americans were least represented according to the proportionality criterion. People of Color frequently appeared in ads for products of value but were shown in disproportionately high numbers in soft drink commercials. Starring roles for Caucasians decreased while starring roles for People of Color increased.

Whiter than White: A cross cultural comparison of skin tones in advertisements from Singapore, India and the USA • Katherine Frith, Nanyang Technological University, Kavita Karan and James Chen • Flawless, fair skin has long been valued for its beauty in Asia and in the West. Thus, marketers produce a variety of products for women that claim to increase skin fairness. In this study we look at the historical evidence that links fairness with beauty.

Job Satisfaction Among Minority Advertising Professionals • Jami Fullerton, Oklahoma State University, Alice Kendrick and Connie Frazier • Government investigations and the resulting advertising agency initiatives involving the hiring and retention of racial or ethnic minority employees have received substantial coverage in the trade press in the past two years. The current study provides data regarding job satisfaction — one important aspect of employee retention – among minority advertising employees.

Special Topics
Sound Advertising: A Review of the Experimental Evidence on the Effects of Music • David Allan, Saint Joseph’s University • This paper reviews the empirical studies on the effects of music on advertising. The most relevant literature is analyzed through the formation of two comprehensive tables of theories and experiments. Music variables such as appeal, fit, melody, mood, tempo, texture, tonality, and valence are shown to influence consumer attitude toward the ad and the brand, recall, pleasure and arousal, and purchase intention. The review concludes with the identification of future research issues into sound advertising.

The Ad Bowl Score Keepers: USA Today vs. Advertising Age • Bonnie Drewniany, University of South Carolina • The management at CareerBuilder is reported to have been so disappointed by a poor showing in the 2007 USA Today Super Bowl Ad Meter that they called for an agency review. The advertising agency subsequently quit. Curiously, the very same campaign that fumbled in the USA Today Ad Meter scored a touchdown in the Advertising Age Ad Review.

Considering a General Theory of Creativity in Advertising: The Value of a Socio-Cultural Model • Lee Earle, Roosevelt University • While the previous literature has looked at specific elements of creativity in isolation, in reality it is a multi-dimensional phenomenon. By reviewing articles from advertising and other disciplines, this paper will examine creativity not from the perspective of individual process or potential but, rather, as an end product. From this viewpoint, a general theory of creativity will be established utilizing a socio-cultural model, one that requires interaction between three subsystems: creator, domain, and field.

A Visual History of Women’s Images in Advertising in Singapore from 1960-2000 • Katherine Frith, Nanyang Technological University • Her World has been the top-selling women’s magazine in Singapore since 1960. To remain relevant for such a long period of time, the magazine must reflect images that are resonant to readers. Thus, a historical analysis of the advertising images in Her World over forty years can tell us a great deal about how Asian women of various races have seen themselves reflected in the pages of this popular Asian women’s magazine.

Positively Negative: Arguments in Favor of Political Attack Ads • Michael Maynard, Temple University • This position paper argues in favor of negative political advertising. The case for negative political advertising, including the Attack Ad, is supported because negative political advertising draws more attention and contrasts differences between candidates more effectively than positive ads. It is also argued that negative political advertising engages the mind, levels the playing field, stimulates voter turnout, and advances democracy.

The Power of Political Advertising Advocacy: A Case-Study of 2006 Missouri Election Stem-Cell Celebrity Endorsements • Lori McKinnon, Oklahoma State University, Trish McBeath and Nicole Nascenzi • The authors use a case-study analysis to examine celebrity endorsements in advertising supporting and opposing the 2006 Missouri amendment on stem-cell research. The spots in this case received considerable coverage in the national news media selected for analysis. Not only do the authors conclude that the use of celebrities in this case was effective, but also that these spots helped focus the national news agenda on the Missouri race and on the stem-cell research issue.

Cathy’s Book: If Found Call (650) 266-8233: This Is Not a Game • Sharon Terrell, University of Southern Mississippi • Books have traditionally been on the bare fray of utilization for the practice of product and brand placement. Cathy’s Book: If Found Call (650) 266-8233, (2006) created a vigorous debate about using product placement in children’s books, and the issue of rewriting a novel for the purpose of including such placements. The authors of the book inked a deal with CoverGirl (Proctor & Gamble), to alter the storyline to reflect their products.

Student Papers
Effects of Proximity: Sponsor and Consumer Location Influences on Recall of Collegiate Athletic Program Advertisers • Glenda Alvorado, Texas Tech University • The majority of collegiate sporting programs garner a large portion of their budgets from some form of sponsorship. Donors to a collegiate athletic program were surveyed as to what effect variables such as game attendance and proximity to a university have on sponsor recall and the value respondents place on such advertiser support. Findings suggest that both the location of the sponsor and location of the consumer play a part in sponsorship recall.

Understanding Health Promotion Strategies and Appeals • Tae Hyun Baek and Hyunjae Yu, University of Georgia • Drawing from behavior change theories, this study explores how health promotion strategies and appeals are used differently in the United States and South Korean weight-loss Web sites. The results suggest that weight-loss Web sites in both the U.S. and South Korea hold that the essential characteristics of health promotion strategies are to promote effective and efficient use of informational resources and to provide benefits of collaboration.

Comparing the cognitive impact of conventional television advertising and product placement: A fist look • David Carr, University of Wisconsin-Madison • Product placements continue to be adopted as economically viable alternatives to conventional television advertising, yet the majority of the research regarding product placement has focused on motion pictures. To begin expansion of the scope of knowledge regarding product placement, this experiment examined the comparative cognitive impact of product placements and conventional television advertisements. Analysis of the data revealed that audiovisual product placements may generate higher levels of cognitive impact than conventional television advertisements.

The influence of visual images in print advertisements • Dohnia Dorman, University of New Mexico • A post-test only experimental study was conducted to investigate the difference in consumer attitude toward the advertisement, attitude toward the brand (beliefs), and purchase intention between a magazine print advertisement with the advertised product versus one with visual imagery—visual content such as couple interacting with each other. Positive and negative emotional responses to the two advertisements were also analyzed. T-test analyses showed that the two advertisements elicit separate consumer attitudes, purchase intention, and emotions.

Where Would Ads Work During Multi-Segment Broadcasts? A Four-Year Research Of Advertising Position Effects In Super Bowl Broadcasts • Yongick Jeong and Hai Tran, University of North Carolina • This study examined the impacts of ad positions on advertising effectiveness in Super Bowl broadcast, a multi-segment television program. The results support general primacy effects. The brands advertised during the first half are better recognized than those appeared in the second half. The findings also indicate that the brands shown in earlier quarters are better remembered than those in later quarters. However, advertising liking was not related to the positions of commercials.

World Cup as Creative Motif of Internet Advertising Across Cultures • Jong Woo Jun and Hyung-Seok Lee, University of Florida • Focusing on ambush marketing, this cross-national study explores the depiction of cultural values on banner ads run during the 2006 FIFA World Cup Germany period. Based on Trompenaars and Hampden-Turner’s cultural dimension including those of Hofstede, and Hall, a cross-national content analysis was performed to compare cultural values embedded in banner ads from Korea, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

The impact of regulatory fit on message framing effect • Hui-Feng Lin, Pennsylvania State University • This study posits that fit between message framing of product attributes and one’s regulatory focus is expected to lead to greater persuasion effects. A 2 (Regulatory focus: promotion vs. prevention) x 2 (Products attributes: hedonic vs. utilitarian) x 2 (Message framing: gain vs. loss) between-subjects design was used (N=215). As hypothesized, findings showed that when product attributes framed as gain or loss frames fit one’s regulatory focus, stronger attitudes toward brands and advertisements were found.

Think pink: The effect of cause-related marketing on feeling toward the ad • Sarah Nightingale, Rebecca Chrisner and Ajija Farmer, Kansas State University • Companies are under increasing pressure to behave in a socially responsible manner and many companies have partnered with non-profit organizations in cause-related marketing (CRM) strategies. This paper reports the impact of vague and specific donations to a breast cancer fund on student’s perceived feelings towards a breakfast cereal advertisement. The results demonstrate that the inclusion of a charitable donation elevated participants’ warm and upbeat feelings toward the ad.

DTC Antidepressant Advertising and Future Intentions to Consult Doctors to Discuss Depression • Jin Seong Park and Wan Seop Jung, University of Florida • The authors proposed and tested a conceptual model that specifies the pathways through which a number of factors potentially determine intentions to consult doctors to discuss depression. Based on survey with 206 undergraduates, this study found exposure to direct-to-consumer (DTC) antidepressant advertising positively related to the perceived prevalence of depression.

Measuring issue and image in political advertising: An informational/transformational approach • Feng Shen, University of Florida • An experiment examines Puto and Wells informational/transformational advertising scale in the context of issue and image political advertising. The purpose is to empirically prove the conceptual similarity between information/transformation and issue/image and assess the validity of using the scale to measure the perception of issue and image content in political advertisements.

The reality behind television advertising: Influence of product placements on viewer recall, recognition and purchase intention • Xiuli Wang, Lisa Wortman, Jiyeong Jeong, Hsin-Yi Ting and Gang Han, Syracuse University • This study uses a within-group experimental design to test how the size, position and length of a product placement influence viewer recognition, recall and intentions to purchase the featured brands. Length turns out to be highly significant for viewers’ recognition and recall of the featured brands and also their purchase intention, with longer product placements resulting in better memory of the brands and higher purchase intention.

A cross-cultural study on women’s role portrayals in Chinese and American Web Advertising • Jie Zhan and Shu Chuan Chu, University of Texas-Austin • This study examines the differences and similarities of women’s role portrayals in Web advertising between China and the US. In addition to Hofstede’s cultural dimension of individualism/collectivism, this study input Triandis’ horizontal versus vertical individualism/collectivism typology to further analyze the role portrayals of women. The author’s content-analyzed women’s role portrayals in 378 Web ads selected from top Chinese and American portal Websites.

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Online Self-presentation and Identity Management in MySpace Profiles: Gender Similarities and Differences • Soo Jeong An, Northwestern University • This paper studies online self-presentation and identity management among males and females who use MySpace, one of the most visited social networking services (SNSs) in the U.S. Online self-presentation and identity management are examined by content analysis through the online name selection and the disclosure of personal information on 774 users’ profiles to analyze gender similarities and differences.

Justice Revisited: A Pilot Study of Print Media Coverage of the Andrea Yates Murder Trials • Barbara Barnett, University of Kansas • In 2001 Andrea Yates systematically drowned her five children in the bathtub of the Houston home, claiming that Satan instructed her to do so. A jury convicted her of murder and sentenced her to life in prison. However, after the revelation that a key prosecution witness had given false testimony, Yates was re-tried in 2005 and found not guilty by reason of insanity.

Gender and Journal Scholarship in Mass Communication: How Well are Women Doing? A 20-Year Content Analysis • John Torres Bodle, Larry Burriss and Shana Hammaker, Middle Tennessee State University; and Jaya Joshi, Southern Illinois University at Carbondale • A census of authorship (N=9,090) articles produced by 14,348 gender-identified authors) in 18 primary journalism and mass communication journals from 1986-2005 indicates that over the time period women produced 32.3% of the journal scholarship—a per capita rate greater than their numeric representation on journalism and mass communication faculties nationally. In recent years (2001-2005) women produced 38.7% of journal scholarship while representing about 32% of faculty. Female assistant professors produced the most (31.2 %) journal scholarship.

Bad Girls, Relational Warfare, and Reality TV: A Narrative Analysis of The Bad Girls Club • Mackenzie Cato, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill • Television – a popular medium glamorizing bad-girl lifestyles – gives us sitcoms, soap operas, and reality shows centered around young girls and women portraying the bad-girl stereotype as sneaky, sexualized, underhanded, and ruthlessly competitive. In 2006, the Oxygen network premiered an original reality series entitled The Bad Girls Club, which successfully targeted the younger end of the network’s coveted 18-49 demographic and quickly became Oxygen’s most watched show with the highest ratings in the network’s history.

His or Hers? The Role of Editor and Reporter Gender on Newspaper Section Fronts • Marsha Ducey, University of Buffalo • This study compared the frequency, placement and topics of stories by male and female reporters in U.S. newspapers to see what role the gender of the managing editor may have played in newspaper content. The area of study is significant and relevant because of the newspaper industry’s continued discussions of diversity and its potential impact and benefits, especially as it concerns representing the public and newspaper readers.

Perfect Little Feminists? Young Girls Interpret Gender, Violence, and Friendship in the Powerpuff Girls • Spring-Serenity Duvall, Indiana University-Bloomington • The purpose of this paper is to extend previous debates about the positive and negative aspects of the multi-media phenomenon The Powerpuff Girls by analyzing the program as a third wave feminist text that promotes both Girl Power and consumerism in addition to gendered and violent representations. In addition, I interviewed young girls to elicit their interpretations of gender, violence and friendship, and examines the blurred lines between their mediated and real life experiences.

Alternative Feminist Media on the Airwaves: Exploring Women’s Music Radio Programs in the U.S. • Erika Engstrom, University of Nevada-Las Vegas • This paper addresses the feminist implications of women’s music radio programs, a form of alternative feminist media. The author presents an overview of these programs aired on non-profit radio stations, which offer a variety of music genres and presentation styles and provide an outlet for music created by women that otherwise would not be heard. As media artifacts, women’s music radio programs offer multiple layers of feminist inquiry.

Family Friendly? A Study of the Work-Family Balance in Journalism • Tracy Everbach, University of North Texas • In-depth interviews with 26 journalists about how they balance work and family showed that media organizations lack flexibility in employees’ requests for family accommodations. Other findings were that female journalists continue to assume most of the responsibility for childcare and housework, even with high-pressure journalism jobs; individual newsroom supervisors strongly influence how much work flexibility journalists receive; and younger journalists are more focused on family-work balance than older journalists.

The Patriotic Good Mother of World War II: The Creation of An Identity • Ana Garner and Karen Slattery, Marquette University • The U.S. press created a clear identity for mothers of American combat soldiers during the first year of the World War II. In this construction, the archetypal good mother continued some aspects of her maternal work while surrendering others to the military, the government and other mothers. She was portrayed as a patriotic good mother who was cheerful and stoic in the face of severe threats to her child and constraints on her maternal work.

Rethinking TV News Work: Possibilities for Quality News and Work-life • Kim Garris, Pennsylvania State University • To remain competitive among new information platforms, television news is already making changes in content. At the same time, the changing workforce presents challenges to organizations trying to recruit and maintain talented employees. This paper proposes a redesign of newsroom work that addresses both quality of content and the needs of news workers. This model suggests that one consequence of improving conditions for workers is improved quality of the news product.

When Rape Victims Become Symbolic Representations of War: A Textual Analysis of The NY Times Reporting on the Use of ‘Rape as Weapon of War’ in Darfur • Ammina Kothari, University of Oregon • This paper examines how journalists reported about rape victims in Darfur. The findings reveal how rape victims were reduced to symbolic representations of a conflict between Arab and Black Sudanese men. Furthermore, inclusion of graphic details about the acts of rape reinforces the rape victims’ humiliation through public disclosure of their experiences.

Women, the Western Press, and the First Palestinian Intifada • Justin D. Martin, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill • More than two decades have passed since the beginning of the first Palestinian intifada in 1987, a defining conflict in the history of the modern Middle East as well as the Palestinian people, particularly Palestinian women. Palestinian women, previously less involved in public life, were extremely active in the intifada. Through traditional, qualitative analysis, this paper seeks to determine if western newspaper coverage of the conflict recognized the significant role played by women.

Gender Equality in Local Sportscasts: An Analysis of Men’s and Women’s Sports Coverage in Three Local Markets • Renee Martin-Kratzer, University of Florida • Over the last 35 years, Title IX has significantly increased the number of opportunities and participants in women’s sports. However, media coverage of women’s sports has failed to keep pace. Previous research has compared men’s and women’s coverage in both the print and broadcast media at the national level. This study examines the amount of coverage given to women’s sports in the local media.

Coming of Age with Proctor & Gamble: Beinggirl.com and the Commodification of Puberty • Sharon Mazzarella, Clemson University • While girl-targeted feminine hygiene advertising and corporately-produced puberty curriculum materials have been a staple of girl culture in the United States for decades, the Internet era has brought with it more high-tech feminine hygiene marketing strategies. The Proctor & Gamble Web site beinggirl.com, which claims hits of 500,000+ per month and has versions in 43 countries, was launched in July 2000 as a way to educate girls about puberty in general and menarche in particular.

Shop ‘til you Drop: Commodification, QVC and the American Female Consumer • Gigi McNamara, Pennsylvania State University • Once known for hawking cheap jewelry, home shopping is now a highly lucrative industry. This paper, through the use of textual analysis, examines the communication methods employed by hosts on the QVC home shopping channel. Furthermore, I offer a historical overview of consumption and argue the home shopping perpetuates the myth of the idealized female consumer. In commodifying the female viewer, I contend, home shopping contributes to the collapsing of private and public spheres.

Coverage of the Female Athlete • Jon Mills, University of Alabama and Courtney Carpenter Childers, University of Tennessee • This study analyzed how female athletes were depicted in Sports Illustrated photographs and feature stories during two Summer Olympics. Analyses of 24 articles from Olympic coverage in 1984 and 2004 suggest that women are discussed in ways that deemphasize athlete status by highlighting personal characteristics, as well as emphasizing athletes’ alternate. However, an analysis of 92 photographs that accompanied the stories were surprising: Sports Illustrated is not consistent with recent research on female athletes’ sexuality.

Constructing the Self for Mr. Right: A Comparative Study of American and Chinese Women’s Online Personals • Xiaoyan Pan, University of Maryland at College Park • The content analysis examines the role culture play in women’s gender identity construction as reflected in online personal advertisements both in the U.S. and the People’s Republic of China. The analysis of 600 advertisements shows that American women exhibit higher masculinity and lower femininity in personal profiles than their Chinese counterparts.

The Power of Pink: Accessing the Dominant Public Sphere While Opposing War • Sara Struckman, University of Texas-Austin • Groups of women have been registering their dissent about societal issues for centuries. Long before the modern women’s movement, women all over the world organized themselves against poor working conditions, against slavery, for women’s suffrage, against high food prices. This paper seeks to assess the “influence” and “success” of women’s direct action in shaping debates.

Media Portrayal of Women Leaders of Foreign Countries in 21st Century • Arman Tarjimanyan, Ohio University • This study analyzed the coverage of women heads of state in five U.S. mainstream political and financial magazines. The main purpose of the study was to test media biases previously found in the coverage of women political leaders. The study discovered that many biases of media treatment of women leaders are still present. Particularly, women leaders were framed more often, and physical descriptive of women leaders were mentioned more often than these of men leaders.

“If it’s a woman’s issue, I pay attention to it”: Identity in the Heart Truth campaign • Jennifer Vardeman, University of Maryland and Natalie Tindall, University of Oklahoma • Heart disease disproportionately affects racioethnic groups. Among all minority groups, Black/African-American women and Latinas have higher mortality rates from cardiovascular disease than other ethnic groups. This study examines the impact of cultural and racioethnic identity on women’s understanding and meaning-making of health and heart disease. Specifically, this research examines how women of color understand, perceive, and interpret the Heart Truth campaign, a health communication campaign produced by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute.

A Qualitative Study of Pro-Eating Disorder Blogging Communities • Andrea Weare, Iowa State University • Experts argue that sensationalist coverage of too-thin celebrities heightens the taboo of eating disorders. Females suffering from such diseases and those with habits to develop them find themselves unable to speak out in fear of stigmatization. The Internet, however, offers such a location where many maintain a blog, encouraging fellow bloggers to not eat, work out, and think thin.

What Do Women Want? Exploring the Sports Media Consumption Habits of Women • Erin Whiteside and Marie Hardin, Pennsylvania State University • Although women have enjoyed increased opportunity to compete in athletics over the past 35 years, we have not seen a parallel increase in women’s sports coverage. Media producers cite a lack of demand but popular assumptions hold that women should and want to watch women’s sports. This research explores the process and motivations of women for consuming sports media.

Escorts, Attack Dogs or Style Setters: How Magazine Reporters Covered the 2004 Presidential Candidates’ Wives • Geri Alumit Zeldes and Brittany Foley, Michigan State University • Three frames of presidential candidates’ wives observed by previous researchers seem to be disappearing from magazine coverage: protocol style-setter, noblesse oblige, and policy advisor. In their place, magazines focused on the narrow themes of first ladies or candidate’s wives as wives, mothers and husband defenders/supporters. This is interesting because it suggests that coverage is moving to a more narrow conception of the role of first lady rather, than extending a more multi-faceted role.

<< 2008 Abstracts

Small Programs 2008 Abstracts

Small Programs Interest Group

Hiring Patterns and Diffusion of New Media in AEJMC News Journalism Job Announcements, 1990-2006 • Dave Sennerud, and Joseph Bernt, Ohio University • In the past decade, communication technologies were revolutionized by the Internet, and journalism-related industries have evolved, converged, and concentrated in response to this revolution. This exploratory study examines how these technological and structural changes have affected journalism and mass communication programs. Through a content analysis of all announcements for faculty openings published in January issues of the AEJMC News from 1990, 1998, and 2006, two research questions were addressed.

Mass Communication and Journalism Faculty’s Perceptions of the Effectiveness of E-mail Communication with College Students: A Nationwide Study • Brad Yates, University of West Georgia; Jennifer Wood Wood Adams, Auburn University and Brigitta R. Brunner • This nationwide survey focused on the content of e-mail sent by faculty to students, e-mail’s impact on workload, e-mail policies, e-mail’s effectiveness, and e-mail’s effect on student learning. Comparisons were made based on faculty gender, rank, age, and ethnicity. Findings suggest that despite statistical differences when gender, rank, age or ethnicity are considered, faculty are not in the habit of sending course materials like syllabi, project instructions, and lecture notes to students personally via e-mail.

<< 2008 Abstracts

Science Communication 2008 Abstracts

Science Communication Interest Group

Environmental legitimacy: Developing reliable and valid measures of perceived organizational environmental performance • Denise Bortree, Penn State University • Communication about environmental policies and practices has become a critical area of focus for corporations. Organizations that are perceived as more environmentally responsible experience fewer negative consequences from key stakeholders and tend to be favored by consumers. This research developed and tested measures of environmental legitimacy. It also measured the relationship between environmental legitimacy and two other variables, ethical environmental communication and knowledge of organizational environmental performance. Both relationships were significant in a positive direction.

Digital Veils, Virtual Triage, and Health Taboos: Health Information Seeking and Anonymity on the Web • Chris Brabham, University of Utah • This qualitative research links together converging literature about health information-seeking on the Web, the notion of anonymity on the Web, and health taboos. Data from open-ended responses to an online health survey (N = 366) are collected. Analyses of the responses to questions about private health conditions reveal an unchanging array of health taboos and embarrassing health conditions.

Why Can’t They Get it Right? Mobilizing Journalism, Government Accountability, and the Autism-Vaccine Controversy • Chris Clarke, Cornell University • The mass media are often criticized for inadequately presenting health risk information to the public. This paper argues, however, that decisions to include risk information represent a fundamental tension between norms of objectivity and government accountability on one end and “mobilizing” journalism on the other. The paper explores this tension in the context of the autism-vaccine controversy. Implications for journalism ethics and risk communication are discussed.

Conflict Theory and Climate Change News: The Interplay of Media, Science, Politics, Industry and Audience • Julia Corbett, Lindsay E. Young, and Byron L. Davis, University of Utah • This study investigated factors contributing to the mercurial path of U.S. news coverage of climate change since 1985. Time-series analysis uncovered both “leaders” and “followers”: media attention to climate change was led by Congressional attention, and after several years, by increasing temperatures. There were feedback loops between public concern and a variety of factors, including news coverage. Scientific evidence had the most complex role, leading and following numerous variables both positively and negatively.

Socialization or rewards: Prediciting American scientist-media interactions • Sharon Dunwoody, Dominique Brossard, and Anthony Dudo, University of Wisconsin-Madison • This study investigates scientists as public communicators, particularly what factors encourage or discourage scientists from engaging in public communication via interactions with the media. Based on a US survey of biomedical scientists, the findings suggest that scientists continue to have more contact with the media than has commonly been assumed, and that status, socialization (measured via formal communication training and communication self-efficacy) and positive intrinsic rewards are all positively associated with higher frequencies of media contact.

Social Proximity and Risk: A Comparative Analysis of Media Coverage of Avian Flu in Hong Kong and in the United States • Timothy Fung, Kang Namkoong, and Dominique Brossard, University of Wisconsin-Madison Media • The purpose of this paper is to compare media coverage of avian flu in Hong Kong and in the United States, based on an analytical framework derived from the literature on public risk perceptions. Notably, this study uses the psychometric paradigm to identify a number of dimensions that should be taken into account when analyzing news coverage of risky issues.

Scientists’ Understanding of Nanotechology, Nanoscience and the Public • Amelia Greiner, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health; Laura Black, Ohio University; Katherine McComas, Cornell University and Chris Clarke, Cornell University • This study investigates what scientists engaging in nanoscale science and engineering (NSE) research understand about the public and its perceptions of nanotechnology. It offers a qualitative analysis of 20 in-depth interviews with prominent NSE scientists that explores their perceptions of nanotechnology, public knowledge, and the appropriate role of public engagement. The conclusions suggest implications for public engagement, while offering future directions for science communication scholars advocating public engagement more generally.

Understanding how audiences understand science on stage: Cultural context in the dramatization of Darwin’s letters • Megan Halpern, Cornell University • This study explored the relationship between science, performance, and audience in a theatrical production of RE:Design, A Dramatisation of the Correspondence of Charles Darwin and Asa Gray by Craig Baxter. A focus group and supplementary survey were conducted to learn what audience members thought they had received from attending the performance.

A Crying Shame: Shaken Baby Syndrome in the News • Heidi Hennink-Kaminski, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Elizabeth Dougall, Chapel Hill • This paper reports a qualitative analysis of broadcast news and newspaper coverage of Shaken Baby Syndrome from 1992 to 2007. The findings indicate that episodic coverage of SBS from a criminal justice perspective was the most dominant story type; thematic coverage in the form of health features emerged but with much less frequency. The dominant frames were SBS in question, scared straight, and cautionary tales. Sources were more often law enforcement, medical, and legal.

Tacit Understandings of Health Literacy: Interview and Survey Research With Health Journalists • Amanda Hinnant, Missouri School of Journalism and Maria Len-Rios, University of Missouri • This research offers both qualitative and quantitative data about how health journalists approach health literacy practically and conceptually. Using interviews with 20 writers and editors for magazines and newspapers and a survey (N=396), this analysis uncovers journalistic techniques and tacit theories for making information understandable. Findings show that journalists struggle to maintain scientific credibility while accommodating different audience literacy levels. Journalists’ definitions of health literacy strategically carve out a place for their work as translators.

Influences of Mass Media, Interpersonal Communication, and Cognitive Processing on Risks versus Benefits Perception of Nanotechnology • Shirley Ho, University of Wisconsin-Madison and Dietram Scheufele, University of Wisconsin-Madison and Elizabeth Corley, Arizona State University • This study examines the influences of mass media, interpersonal communication, and cognitive processing on perception of risks versus benefits in the context of nanotechnology, using a nationally representative telephone survey conducted in 2007. Results indicate that cognitive processes in the form of reflective integration had a significant negative main effect on risks-versus-benefits perception.

Nationwide Newspaper Coverage of Adult Obesity: A Community Structure Approach • Kristen Kiernicki, The College of New Jersey and John Pollock, College of New Jersey • A national cross-section of 28 newspapers was selected from Newsbank. Articles were scored for placement, length, headline size, presence of photographs or graphics, and “direction” (advocating for community responsibility, individual responsibility or a combination). Pearson correlations and regressions explored links between city demographics and coverage and revealed five clusters of characteristics that had significant relationships to newspaper coverage of adult obesity including race, lifestyle and SES.

Assessment of a university-based program of citizen engagement on emerging technologies • Victoria L. Kramer, University of South Carolina and John Besley, University of South Carolina • This study assesses the impact of a novel citizen engagement model. “Citizens’ Schools” on nanotechnology and fuel cell and hydrogen technology enhanced participants’ senses of science efficacy, the interpersonal fairness of scientists, and to a limited extent the procedural and informational fairness of scientists. Participation was also associated with changes in views about the risks and benefits of technology. This study advances theory in the use of justice as fairness in evaluating deliberative citizen engagement.”

Quantification of Medical News Coverage in US Newspapers • William YY Lai, University of Hong Kong • This study investigates front-page newspaper coverage of two prominent medical stories reported in the United States, with a hard news story chosen as a control. For each story, over 300 newspaper front pages were surveyed to quantify the extent of coverage (interrater agreement for all stories: >96 percent observed agreement, kappa>0.84), and identify different news sources (all stories: >90 percent observed agreement, kappa>0.80).

Source selection: A case study on agenda setting in newspaper reports following an FDA announcement on meat cloning • Jane W. Peterson, Iowa State University; Michael Bugeja, Iowa State University and Jennifer Scharpe, Iowa State University • This case study analyzes patterns of coverage by newspaper reporters following a Food and Drug Administration announcement about meat cloning. Researchers identified sources used in 81 U.S. newspapers and 37 articles from world newspapers. The study suggests that unbalanced sourcing is a chief component of agenda setting and is potentially more pronounced in science communication due to reporter lack of knowledge about the subject matter. Comparisons of U.S. vs. world newspaper sourcing also are presented.

Science vs. Sentiment: A comparison of framing in newspaper headlines and the stories they introduce • Yvonne Price, University of Florida • This study compared newspaper headline and story framing of a global science issue—the redefining of our solar system from nine planets, to eight. This global science event provided a unique opportunity to analyze how the media’s framing may be influencing the communication of hard science news.

Making Sense of Emerging Nanotechnologies: How Ordinary People Form Impressions of New Technology • Susanna Priest, UNLV and Victoria L. Kramer, University of South Carolina • Nanotechnology provides opportunities to observe opinion formation for previously unfamiliar technologies. In a panel study design, 76 individuals in South Carolina, recruited via community groups, were interviewed and surveyed during summer 2007. The results confirm some ideas about how people form opinions, while challenging others. Although 64 of the 76 reported they were not (or not very) familiar with nanotechnology, they offered 164 specific images or associations, largely consistent with scientists’ usage of the term.

Matching News Frames with Audience Values: Moderating Affect Related to Issues of Climate Change • Sonny Rosenthal • This study examined the relationship between environmental value-orientations and environmental concern, moderated by value-oriented news frames. Results show that, while a frame alone does not increase value-matched concern, the strength of the relationship between a value-concern pair was greatest after exposure to a value-matched frame. This has implications for how journalists report on environmental issues, particularly climate change.

Gender Stereotypes of Scientist Characters in Television Programs Popular Among Middle School-Aged Children • Jocelyn Steinke, Western Michigan University; Marilee Long, Colorado State University; Marne Johnson, Western Michigan University; and Savani Ghosh, Western Michigan University • This study examined gender stereotyping in portrayals of scientist characters in television programs popular among middle school-aged children. Male scientist characters were found to be both more prevalent than female scientist characters; and they were more likely to be shown with the masculine attributes or traits of independence, athleticism, and dominance. Female scientist characters were not more likely than male scientist characters to be shown with the traditional feminine attributes of dependency, caring, and romantic.

Preparing for Disaster: An Examination of Public Health Preparedness Information on Local TV Web sites • Andrea Tanner, Daniela Friedman, Daphney Barr, and Alexis Koskan, University of South Carolina • This study provides a nationwide examination of public health emergency information on local television Web sites, analyzing 293 news stories that focused on all aspects of a potential emergency, including preparedness, response and recovery. Mobilizing information (MI), defined as information that aids people to act, was also examined. Public health emergency information was present on nearly all (96%) of the sites examined.

Compliance Gaining to Change Parenting Behaviors in Cognitive-Behavioral Violence Prevention Groups • Maria Elena Villar, Florida International University • This study analyzed behavior change messages as recalled by Hispanic participants in cognitive behavioral violence prevention (CB-VP) Fatherhood groups in Miami, Florida. Using concepts from health behavior, compliance gaining and social influence, messages were classified by topic, type of behavior targeted and compliance gaining strategies used. The methodology used in this study provided a greater understanding of the motivations used to support behavior change in violence prevention parenting groups.”

Communicating the risks of Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder: Effects of message framing and exemplification • Nan Yu, Lee Ahern, Colleen Connolly-Ahern, and Fuyuan Shen, The Pennsylvania State University • This study seeks to extend and elaborate on research in message framing in health communication by examining potential interaction between gain-loss frames and exemplar-statistics message appeals. The experiment also looks at a class of health issue that has received little scrutiny – a prevention behavior that requires the cessation of a potentially dangerous activity.

<< 2008 Abstracts

Religion and Media 2008 Abstracts

Religion and Media Interest Group

‘I’d vote for him because…’ Religious beliefs and closed mindedness as factors
explaining how individuals use political endorsements when evaluating candidates • John Wirtz, University of Minnesota-Twin Cities • The current study explores the degree to which agreement with orthodox Christian beliefs (Hunsberger, 1989) and cognitive closed mindedness (Webster & Kruglansk, 1994) explain variation in how individuals use endorsements when evaluating political candidates. Participants were randomly assigned to one of three candidate endorsement conditions (Christian/conservative, secular/liberal, local/neutral) and asked to read a portion of a campaign website including position statements and the political endorsements. Participants then described what was important when evaluating the candidate.

Time to “get” religion? An analysis of religious literacy among journalism students • Jeremy Littau and Debra Mason, University of Missouri • Research shows the earlier students are exposed to a topic, the greater the potential for long-term knowledge gain. A survey (N=513) tested religious knowledge for journalism students and non-journalism students. Results indicate journalism students scored poorly on basic religious knowledge and in fact fared no better than non-journalism students. We argue that small changes in curriculum emphasis can help increase religious knowledge and improve job performance for journalists, who face an increasing diversity in both readership and news sources.

Reporting Buddhism in Taiwan • Chiung Hwang Chen, Brigham Young University-Hawaii • Through analyzing media coverage of Buddhist events and utilizing interviews with key actors in media and Buddhism, this paper examines how the mainstreaming of Buddhism in Taiwan has changed, if at all, people’s perception and understanding about Buddhism. Specifically, the paper assesses both the position of Buddhism in contemporary Taiwanese society and the media/Buddhism relationship.

The Double-Edged Sword: LDS Church Leaders’ Messages on Media, 1900-1948 • James Phillips and Brad Rawlins, Brigham Young University • This study is the first attempt to examine every remark LDS (Mormon) Church leaders have made in the church’s bi-annual conference regarding mass media. Utilizing grounded theory, sermons covering the pre-television era were inspected, with several themes emerging. Overall church leaders viewed media as a powerful tool that could be used for good or ill, cautioning church members to practice selective exposure.

The Press, Pulpit and Public Opinion: The Clergy’s Conferral of Power and the Concomitant Call for a Journalism of Advocacy in an Age of Reform • Ronald Rodgers, University of Florida • This study of the discourse that appeared in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century in books, the newspaper trade journals, and periodicals – both secular and religious – reveals the pulpit’s publicly stated conferral of its role of agent of education and moral uplift to the press as the moral agent for change in an age of reform and demographic upheaval.

“Who Does God Want Me to Invite to See This Movie?”: Thoughts on Marketing The Passion of the Christ to Evangelicals • Jim Trammell, St. John Fisher College • The analysis explores dominant themes of The Passion of the Christ’s marketing campaigns to evangelical Christians, and explores what these themes reveal about the relationship between religion, media and consumption. The marketing suggested that Passion’s purported accuracy, authenticity, rating and images culminate into an experience that would appeal not only to the faithful, but to the unchurched as well. It also challenges the notion that religious cultures are weakened through cultural consumption.

A Question of Ethics: Comparing Framing of Stem Cell Research in Evangelical and Mainstream News Media • Nicole Smith Dahmen and Lisa Lundy, Louisiana State University • Scientific knowledge is gained through a complex environment and is heavily influenced by one’s beliefs, values, and the views of other people. As such, the religious connection in stem cell research provides a fruitful area of inquiry. This study extends previous research to compare mainstream news coverage with evangelical news sources.

Cinematic Spiritualities: Finding Religion in Bollywood • Ally Ostrowski, University of Colorado • Bollywood cinema is a proverbial machine, cranking out upwards of 800 new films each year. Recently, however, Indian directors have begun looking toward Hollywood for an abundance of storylines to reform for Bollywood consumers. In most cases the original Hollywood plotline is indiscernible amidst the Bollywood panacea of singing and dancing and Indian religious references are often inserted to validate and legitimate characterizations, situations and bring an Indian cultural atmosphere that Bollywood audiences require.

Effectiveness of Islamic School Teachers in the Intervention of U.S. News Media Framing of Islam on Muslim Students • Thomas E. Ruggiero, University of Texas at El Paso • Informed by Said’s Orientalist theory, this study examines the perceptions of young Muslims and their teachers at U.S. Islamic schools, and how they react to U.S. news media framing about Muslims. Results suggest Muslim teachers and students agreed that news media coverage of Muslims focused primarily on terrorism and war, providing a simplistic and generalized description of Muslims, and of a severe lack of positive images for young Muslims to emulate.

Free from Religion, Bound to Language: The Dilemma of Atheist Discourse, a Case Study • Melissa Tully, University of Wisconsin-Madison • This paper is a case study of the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF), a nontheist, educational group concerned with freethinking and the separation of church and state. Using the FFRF as the primary example, this paper examines discourse related to atheism and non-belief, particularly focusing on the FFRF discourse and news coverage of the Foundation.

Religion, Media Credibility and Support for Democracy in the Arab World • Guy J. Golan, Seton Hall University and Spiro Kiousis, University of Florida • Ever since the events of September 11th, 2001 and the subsequent war in Iraq, the U.S. State Department has invested much effort into winning the hearts and minds of individuals all around the Muslim world. Using secondary data from a large-scale public opinion survey of Arab youth in Egypt and Saudi Arabia, the current study presents a model that identifies the complex and multidimensional relationship between religion based variables, media credibility and individual assessments of democracy.

Scandal is a Sin: How Church and Victims Framed the Boston Catholic Priest Abuse Scandal • Stacie Jankowski, Indiana University • This study examined the framing of causes and solutions by the Catholic Church and abuse victims during the Catholic priest abuse scandal in the Boston Archdiocese from 2001-2003. A random sample of news articles from The Boston Globe and the Boston Herald was analyzed according to source, frame, valence, and thematic or episodic mentions. The analyzed stories were then compared both within the newspaper and between the newspapers.

<< 2008 Abstracts

Internships and Careers 2008 Abstracts

Internships and Careers Interest Group

I’m a People Person!: A look at public relations majors’ perceptions of the major and their first jobs • Brigitta R. Brunner and Margaret Fitch-Hauser, Auburn University • No abstract available.

Correlating Use of Digital Media for News with career planning and expectations • Tony DeMars, Texas A&M University, Commerce and Leo Chan, University of Houston-Clear Lake • No abstract available.

Privileged to be on camera: Sports broadcasters assess factors important to success in the profession • Marie Hardin, Penn State University and Jason Genovese, Bloomsburg University of Pennsylvania • No abstract available.

A comparison of student interns and supervisors regarding internship performance ratings • Lulu Rodriguez, Kimberly McDonough, and Marcia Prior-Miller, Iowa State University • Student media internships require three-way communication among educational institutions, student interns, and workplace supervisors. This study assesses the extent to which interns and supervisors agree in ratings of intern performance. Self-administered questionnaires measured four skill sets that incorporated ACEJMC competencies and related items. Respondents differed in their respective mid- and final evaluations, becoming more congruent as internships progressed. Statistically significant differences were observed as students’ tendency to self-rate performances more highly than did their supervisors.

Learning to learn from the industry: Employer internship satisfaction survey • Dana Saewitz and Michael Maynard, Temple University • A survey to over 100 internship employers, with a best partner response rate of around 90% yielded critical information for improving the university internship program. Three curricular adjustments flowing directly from the feedback are (1) a new course in marketing, (2) a special course in preparing students to interview successfully for jobs, and (3) increased rigor in writing courses throughout the curriculum. The survey has proven to be an excellent learning tool.

Internships and Standard Nine: Shall We Dance? • Lillian Williams, Columbia College • As assessment assumes greater significance for accredited journalism and mass communication programs, an examination of ways that internships are utilized to meet the new assessment requirement is timely. This paper presents a case study of a program that utilizes internships to measure values and competencies cited in accrediting standards. Interviews offer perspectives of key participants, including administrators, faculty, staff, students, and work-site supervisors.

<< 2008 Abstracts

Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender 2008 Abstracts

Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender Interest Group

Effects of Gay and Lesbian Exemplars in News Stories on Reader Perceptions • Rhonda Gibson and Dean C. Smith, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; Joe Bob Hester, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill • A news report about the housing market was manipulated to create versions differing in proportion of sources that were gay or lesbian (none, one-third, two-thirds) and number of photos of gay male and lesbian couples (none, two). Readers estimated the percentage of gays/lesbians in the homebuying/selling population and the general U.S. population. In addition, measures of readers’ attitudes toward homosexuality were tested pre- and post-exposure.

Exploring the link between sports ideology, sports consumption and homophobia • Marie Hardin, Penn State University; T.C. Corrigan, Penn State University; Jennifer Greer, University of Alabama; Kelly Shultz-Poniatowski, Penn State University • Prior research suggests that sports serve as a platform to reinforce heterosexism (Harry, 1995). In this study, college students were surveyed to determine the association of sports ideology with sexist and anti-homosexual attitudes. The influence of mediated sports consumption and participation were also investigated. Results suggest that gender plays a significant role in sexist and anti-homosexual attitudes, mediated sports viewing does not. Furthermore, sports serve as a platform to accommodate rather than create homophobia.

Defining a Gay Logo with Coming Out Stories: Containing Queer Identities with Reality Television • Philip Johnson, Syracuse University • This qualitative study examines the first season of Logo’s Coming Out Stories with textural analysis methods to explore representations of coming out that are depicted within the boundaries of a reality television program. Situated within a queer studies interpretive worldview approach, the author shows how the process and structure of coming out on Coming Out Stories exemplifies and situates representations of LGBT identities in a heternormative mainstream society.

Selling a Cultural Phenomenon: Political Economy and “The L-Word” • Rebecca Kern, Temple University • The L-Word is not a traditional primetime show in ways that go far beyond the structure of the text and the thematic tropes within the narrative. The L-Word on Showtime, a pay cable network, has no outside advertising. This paper focuses on the ways media integrates into the United States economic system, particularly focusing on The L-Word as a program that does not follow traditional media economic models, and the cultural commodities surrounding The L-Word.

An Imposition of Silence: The Closet within the American Society of Newspaper Editors • Gwyneth Mellinger, Baker University • Despite its leadership in the newsroom diversity movement, the American Society of Newspaper Editors failed to incorporate gay identity into its vision of an inclusive newsroom. This paper traces the construction of the closet within ASNE and examines the ways in which gay identity has been marginalized within both the ASNE and the newsroom diversity movement.

Visibility That Demystifies: Gays, Gender, and Sex on Television • Sara Netzley, Bradley University • A content analysis of 98 primetime entertainment programs from the 2005-2006 television season showed that gay characters were more likely to be guest stars on commercial broadcast television than on cable television, and that female characters were more likely to be shown in same-sex sexual situations than male characters. In addition, gay characters made up 7.5% of all the characters coded. This study discusses the implications of these findings for gay and straight audiences.

Coverage of Methamphetamine in GLBT Newspapers • Joseph Schwartz, University of Iowa; Aaron Willis • Research demonstrates that methamphetamine is a serious problem in gay communities. This study examined the framing of methamphetamine in nine gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender (GLBT) newspapers. Results showed that methamphetamine was framed as a “gay problem,” that sexual health and solutions frames were prevalent, and that GLBT newspapers covered methamphetamine in a way that is similar to how they covered AIDS in the 1980s. Implications for health campaigns are discussed.

The Queer Frontier: Dual Perspectives on Primetime Portrayals of Contemporary Gay Representations • John Wolf, Val Scheisberger • Gay representations account for less than 2% of characters on network primetime television. In an era of relative queer conspicuousness, this study examines how television-viewing audiences perceive these gay and lesbian representations. The study combines past literature on representations of minority groups with contemporary principles of queer theory to establish a theoretical foundation. From this groundwork, it is apparent that few audience reactions and perceptions about gay and lesbian representations have been discussed.

<< 2008 Abstracts

Graduate Education 2008 Abstracts

Graduate Education Interest Group

When War is the Only Option: A qualitative analysis of cancer narrative development and effects • Kathleen Pontius, University of Oregon • Communication campaigns have led to the creation of an expected experience for those affected by cancer. This project combines rhetorical analysis of communications material published by the Lance Armstrong Foundation with data from young adult cancer survivor interviews to identify a dominant cancer narrative and examine how cancer patients challenge this narrative. Using the theoretical lens of constitutive rhetoric, this paper illustrates the effects a limited cancer narrative has on cancer patients and survivors.

Television representing television: How NBC’s 30 Rock parodies and satirizes the culture industry • Lauren Bratslavsky, University of Oregon • Television sitcoms offer a wealth of representations of culture. Of interest is the representation of the workplace, specifically, working in the television industry. An important component to television comedy as well as representation are two humor devices—satire and parody. Using the culture industry, the circuit of culture framework, and humor techniques, this paper analyzes the NBC sitcom, 30 Rock, for its representation of the television industry, the production of culture, and the culture of production.

Becoming “Quirky”: Towards an Understanding of Practitioner and Blogger Relations in Public Relations • Brian Smith, University of Maryland • The growing influence of consumer-generated media (CGM), including blogs, online forums, podcasts, and other social media tools, has changed the environment in which public relations practitioners conduct campaigns for their clients and connect with their stakeholders. Rather than working solely with journalists to reach publics—practitioners may now become part of “the quirky blogging community” to influence the online conversations about their clients.

News, Neighborhoods, and the Need for Understanding: The Cultural Competence of Journalists • Dianne Garyantes, Temple University • The need for understanding diverse cultures is an urgent priority, given increasing globalization and ongoing military conflicts. Yet, journalists have long been criticized for their inability to represent people who are culturally different from themselves. This paper explores the cultural competence of 83 undergraduate journalism students reporting on diverse urban neighborhoods. Findings indicate important implications for journalism education, including that overcoming language barriers and informally talking with local people are key factors in cultural competence.

Public Relations Education in the United States: An International/Chinese Perspective • Ai Zhang, University of Maryland • Identified as the leader in public relations in the world, the US public relations education has profound implications on what and how public relations is understood and practiced in the rest of the world. The present study adopts an international (i.e., Asian/Chinese) perspective to examine a few critical issues and challenges exemplified in the Western public relations education and discuss their implications on international public relations education with a focus on China.

Blogging for Sovereignty: An Exploratory Analysis of Palestinian Blogs • Justin D. Martin, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; Sherine El-Toukhy, University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill • This study is a quantitative content analysis of Palestinian blogs (N=127) in both Arabic and English. Blogs in the sample—authored by Palestinian descendents as well as Palestinian advocates of other nationalities—were examined in terms of political content and treatment of Israel, and for differences in content due to language, nationality of the author (Palestinian, American, Egyptian, British etc.), and authors’ location (whether they resided in Israeli-controlled territory or other countries).

Investigating the Effectiveness of Satellite TV Broadcasting as a Tool for International Political Communication: An Empirical Study • Foad Izadi, Louisiana State University • The present study attempts to address the state of pro-American attitudes and pro-American policy positions in Iran. Using hierarchical OLS regression, the study addresses the influence of satellite TV use – as an indicator of access to U.S. sponsored international broadcasting – on the degree of pro-American opinion, above and beyond individual level demographic factors. In this study, I develop two scales of pro-American attitudes and pro-American policy positions based on individuals‘ responses to a 2006 poll.

Getting News Online: Does Media Habit Matter? • Q. Lisa Bu, University of Wisconsin-Madison • This study investigates the relationship between people’s habits of using traditional news media and their uses of the Internet as their main source of news. A regression analysis is conducted on a secondary dataset, the Biennial Media Consumption Survey 2006 by Pew Research Center. The major findings are (1) Habit of watching television news has a significant positive relationship with having the habit of getting news online.

The Pipeline to Publication: Analysis of Student Research Productivity in Mass Communication Journals • Hai Tran, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill • This research updates knowledge of student scholarly productivity in top-tier mass communication journals. The impetus for the current analysis is a lack of follow-up in this body of literature while there is anecdotal evidence that young academics are increasingly adopting the “publish or perish” mentality in graduate school. In examining a complete census of thirteen mass communication journals between 1999 and 2006, this study provides empirical evidence regarding the pipeline to publication for student research.

The Influence of Sex on Cultivation Effects • Veronica Garcia-Michael, BGSU • This study examines the cultivation effects based on the sex of the subject and the amount of television watched. Specifically, this study examines the effect of television viewing on female and male college students in order to understand what affect television viewing may have on the consumer. A modified version of the Cultivation Index Scale was administered to 157 college students. A series of ANOVA’s were performed on these data.

Supervision and Web News-Editing Accuracy • David Stanton, University of Florida • The current study examines supervision of a Web-driven news production and editing course at a large, southeastern university. The course, which has been taught for over a decade, utilizes a dynamic site driven by a relational database (MySQL via PHP) and AJAX. Content management systems (CMS) allow journalists to remotely input content, edit and deliver the final product to print and Web-based publications.

The Litigious “Wall”: Reviewing China’s Regulations of the Internet from a Positive Perspective • Xudong Liu; Southern Illinois University Carbondale • This paper discussed numerous approaches applied by the Chinese government to monitor or constrain the Internet users. It addressed the main differences between Chinese regulation and the U.S. regulation regarding the Internet. The paper proposed that, due to the complicated IT technology and the Chinese government’s in-efficiency in carrying out those policies, those who use the Internet were not petrified and the regulations failed in many cases.

Virtual Hillary vs. Obama Girl: A Rhetorical Analysis of Gender, Race, and Age in the 2008 Presidential Primary Campaign • Erin Armstrong; E.W. Scripps School of Journalism, Ohio University • This qualitative case study analyzes general rhetorical components of the official websites for Democratic candidates Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama during the 2008 primary campaign. Gender, race, and age are considered through impression management. This study suggests a shift in public relations strategy as website users are building and undermining support for each candidate through website material, like blogs, as well as linked website material, such as posting videos to YouTube and fundraising on Facebook.

<< 2008 Abstracts

Community Journalism 2008 Abstracts

Community Journalism Interest Group

Evaluating Reader Feedback Importance to Newspapers: A Look at Community Structure and Economic Influences • Carly McKenzie, Hal Hays, Jee Young Chung, Chang Wan Woo, and Wilson Lowrey, University of Alabama • This paper compared the relative influence of reader feedback and economic influences with regard to determining news content. A survey of newspaper editors assessed the frequency of monitoring, and the emphasis placed upon, reader responses and key economic indicators. A structural pluralism approach informed the study. Community pluralism was found to function through organizational size to exert influence on newspapers’ attention to audience/clients.

Finding It, Storing It, Discussing It: A Content Analysis of Weekly Newspaper Web Sites • Kelly Mitchell, Erik Collins, and Anna Saunders, University of South Carolina, School of Journalism and Mass Communications • The research reported in this study examined a sample of U.S. local community weekly newspaper Web sites. Specifically, the researchers sought to determine the presence or absence of three key elements – hyperlinks, archives of information and classified advertising, and interactivity – suggested by scholars and practitioners as necessary elements of an ideal newspaper Web site. The findings suggest that many weekly newspapers are not embracing the Internet at all, much less using it to their fullest advantage.

Collaborator or Competitor? Community News Editors’ Perceived Roles of Professional and Citizen Journalists • Seungahn Nah and Deborah Chung, University of Kentucky • Using a statewide, Web-based survey targeting community newspaper editors, this study examines community newspaper editors’ professional role conceptions along with their views of emerging citizen journalists’ roles. Results indicate that while the perceived roles of professional journalists are positively correlated with their perceived roles of citizen journalists, community news editors rate the importance of professional journalists’ roles higher than citizen journalists’ roles.

Using a Newspaper to Stabilize a Community • Lindsey Wotanis, University of Maryland • This paper is a historical inquiry of a regular column written by Gertrude Poe, former editor of The News Leader, the weekly newspaper serving Laurel, Maryland. Poe’s column sought to stabilize the community at a critical time of change—the years following World War II—and its regular appearance in the paper produced a symbolic cultural product that helped not only to define the community, but also to ground it in a time of change.

Beyond Standard Professionalism: Journalism and Language Roles Among European Minority Language Journalists • Iñaki Zabaleta, Journalism, University Basque Country; Nicolás Xamardo, University of the Basque Country; Arantza Gutierrez, University of the Basque Country; Santi Urrutia, University of the Basque Country; Itxaso Fernández, University of the Basque Country; Carme Ferré, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona • This paper examines to what extent European minority language media journalists believe their journalistic role before the community is strictly professional, professional plus language supporter or professional plus language activist/militant. Results from a representative and weighted survey of 230 journalists from ten European language communities indicate they favor a concept of professional journalism in which the role as language development actors is also incorporated. This may suggest the need for a contextual approach to professional journalism.

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