IMF Chief Arrest: Media’s Top Story Draws Little Public Interest
While the media devoted attention to the arrest of the IMF chief, the public had little interest. But a majority have heard a lot about Schwarzenegger’s troubles.
Numbers, Facts and Trends Shaping Your World
The fallout from the killing of Osama bin Laden continued to generate the most attention of any story in the mainstream media last week, though coverage fell off substantially. On cable news, where politics often dictates news agenda, the level of attention varied widely: CNN devoted the most attention to the story and Fox gave it the least.
The 2012 campaign was the top story last week as Republican hopefuls met in a New Hampshire debate that produced some media winners and losers. Worries about the economy were a close No. 2. And three weeks after the initial scandal broke, Anthony Weiner’s resignation was major news.
The study, Non-Profit News: Assessing a New Landscape in Journalism, involved several phases, all of which were performed in-house by PEJ researchers. The primary PEJ staff members conducting the research, analysis and writing included: Tricia Sartor, Weekly News Index manager; Kevin Caldwell, researcher/coder; Nancy Vogt, researcher/coder; Jesse Holcomb, research associate; Amy Mitchell, deputy director; Tom […]
To assess ideology, researchers measured three different elements of a site’s news content. They examined the range of viewpoints represented in each story in which the subject involved some matter of disagreement, conflict or controversy. They looked at the narrative frame of the story to see if it reflected one of a detailed list of […]
In a week in which the president defended his Libya policy to the American public, the Middle East again topped the news agenda. But coverage of that subject and the aftermath of the Japanese earthquake tailed off a bit last week as both crises defied any quick resolution.
A natural disaster at home, a royal wedding abroad and the release of a birth certificate were all among the big news-making events from April 25-May 1. News about the economy and violence in the Middle East vied for attention too. But all that changed abruptly in the week’s waning hours.