Doctoral Dissertations

Jon M. Smith

Date of Award

12-1997

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy

Major

Communication

Major Professor

Barbara A. Moore

Committee Members

M. Mark Miller, Mark E. Littman, Robert E. Jones

Abstract

How do the television networks portray disparate views when covering environmental controversy? Other research indicates media framing suggests the story elements that are emphasized and repeated contribute to the overall story theme and impression received by viewers. Watching television has a negative effect on environmental knowledge and willingness to act in favor of the environment. This study probes these issues by investigating words and pictures used in network television stories on endangered species as they related to advocacy groups or claimsmakers who have a stake in this issue. These groups included government regulators, scientists, environmental activists, prodevelopment or industry representatives, and legislators. The primary area of interest was the apparent influence and interaction between environmental activists and pro-development representatives on news content. Previous studies have shown these claimsmakers to use distinct and relatively exclusive language when discussing controversial issues. This study applies elements of framing theory in primarily quantitative examination of environmental news coverage. In an attempt to find concrete indicators of how the endangered species issues were framed by the news media, a systematic content analysis was conducted on a stratified-by-year random sample of 165 endangered species stories broadcast on network television evening news programs from 1968 to 1997 obtained from the Vanderbilt Television News Archives. Because the networks were the dominant source of news during these years, the programs provide a useful site for examining the way the endangered species issue was presented to US audiences by news media. Verbatim transcripts and the use of the VBPro family of computer programs created by Mark Miller of the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, allowed isolation and examination of interview segments and broadcasters' words to determine dominance by particular claimsmaker groups. A shot-by-shot examination of the length and number of edited shots was used to determine which groups and which activities were shown more often than others. Through t-test and Chi-square statistical analysis, the study found that government regulators contributed most of the interview segments, but that environmental terms or language was used significantly more frequently than pro-development terms. There were also many more pictures of pro-development activities than of environmentalists. The stories tended to blame pro-development and industry for the endangered species problem while showing wide shots of pro-development activity. Humans were generally not seen in shot sequences about pro-development activity. When environmentalist's activities were shown, the shots tended to be close-ups. The tendency to use more pro-development or business at work pictures while using environmental language in the same stories created a situation which lacked apparent content reinforcement or redundancy. The positioning of pro-development pictures with environmental language may tend to emphasize that business is to blame. Frame resonance occurs when messages support and reinforce one another. In the case of network television news stories about endangered species, media framing presents preservation and conservation language from environmentalists which may tend to negatively modify and perhaps invalidate legitimate business activity.

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