The Daily Telegraph as an image resource : a semantic content analysis

Even though traditional research states that British electors base their decisions on party images, this research suggests that the images of party leaders receive greater emphasis in the press than do party images or issues.

This study revealed little or no difference between the number of images and the number of issues mentioned. However, issues were not presented in an in depth evaluative manner. Instead, issues were couched in "personalistic encapsulations," and there was a paucity of specific issue images. Personal quality images and general leadership traits were rich in detail, and 96 percent of all images mentioned in 1974 and l979 were of this nature, There was little discernible difference between the coverage of the 1974 election and the 1979 election. However, the 1979 campaign coverage was less negative generally.

This study is based on a quantitative semantic content analysis of the political coverage provided by The Daily Telegraph during two election time periods: February 8-28, 1974, and April 13-May 3, 1979. Non-consecutive general elections were chosen in order to acquire a difference in incumbency. The Daily Telegraph is associated with the Conservative Party in Great Britain.

The last 21 days of each campaign comprised the samples for the respective years. Front-page political articles (including jumps) and editorial-page political articles were coded. The observation unit for the coding process was a story unit. In 1974, 323 story units were coded, and in 1979, 32l story units were coded.

Coding categories were developed from a thematic analysis of the newspaper. Four coding categories were used: the source of the story unit; the candidate discussed; the substance of the story unit; and the mode of the story unit. One hundred eighty-nine different themes were used to code the substance of the stories. Ninety-nine of these dealt with issues discussed in the campaign. Ninety dealt with qualities associated with party leaders. Inter-coder reliability checks were not applicable. The average intra-coder reliability score for the coding process was 96 percent.

Future research should involve a variety of media as samples. Other national partisan newspapers should be studied as well as regional partisan newspapers. Television news programming and news magazines would also serve as fruitful areas of inquiry. Studies should span additional time periods in order for a more comprehensive comparative analysis.