Talking to Ourselves: A Content Analysis of NPR's Use of Journalists as Sources

Abstract

National Public Radio (NPR) has built its reputation on in-depth analysis and unbiased reporting of information based on questions its reporters ask, the ways reporters tell their stories, and NPR's use of journalists as sources within their stories. This article focuses on understanding how these journalist-sources are used and how this practice contributes to the larger issues of source credibility facing media today. A content analysis of NPR's All Things Considered programming from 1999 to 2009 shows that NPR journalists are used as sources more often in stories about philosophical topics and significantly less often in stories that contain more hard data.