How the Social Complements, Extends or Replaces the Professional: Autonomy and Adaptation in Journalist–Source Relationships

Abstract

ABSTRACT This study uses the process model of journalistic roles and discusses how journalists perceive (normatively and cognitively) and enact (according to their narrated practice) their professional roles upon interaction with socially distant vs. closer sources on the political beat. Specifically, the study looks at how journalists negotiate between their professional and social roles, and balance between autonomy and adaptation to the source when encountering sources with whom they are related by single (purely professional) vs. multiplex (social and professional) social ties. Empirically, the article compares journalist role conception (based on 26 qualitative interviews with journalists in Lithuania and Sweden) and performance (based on 475 reconstructed journalist–source interactions in both countries). The results show that the professional role is fluctuating and sensitive to the social relationship context. In both countries, journalists praised the norm of role autonomy from sources. However, in role performance, professional and social roles influenced each other during interactions with sources. The patterns of negotiating the professional role in different relational contexts to sources were similar regardless of the country.