Press Portrayal Research Articles

Corporate culture: The interview evidence

Corporate culture: The interview evidence

Popular press portrayal of issues surrounding free‐roaming domestic cats Felis catus

Abstract Domestic cats Felis catus have a complex and contentious history. They fill multiple societal roles (e.g. as pest controllers and companion animals), which has led to a variety of animal welfare, conservation, and human health concerns. Popular press articles play an important role in how people learn about key issues surrounding cats, but they may present some issues more frequently than other issues. We conducted a global media content analysis of 796 articles in the English‐language media from 1990 to 2018 on issues related to free‐roaming cats, such as their environmental impacts, the threats and welfare issues cats face, and how they are managed. We aimed to determine whether non‐experts learning about the issues around free‐roaming cats exclusively from the popular press would be exposed to multiple stakeholder views or opinions. Over 95% of articles analysed were from North America. Most of the people interviewed in the popular press were from non‐governmental organizations, mainly from cat welfare or cat rights groups (which are often focused on only one side of the issue). Researchers, shelter organizations, veterinarians, and groups that have different opinions than cat rights or welfare organizations on how to resolve issues surrounding free‐roaming cats were rarely interviewed by the popular press. Most articles focused on cat welfare issues and the management strategies of euthanasia or trap–neuter–release (TNR), whereas less than one‐third of the articles acknowledged that cats have any impact on wildlife or the broader environment. We found that the popular press often presented an oversimplified picture of issues related to free‐roaming cats and provided unbalanced coverage. We also show evidence of framing by the popular press, including mainly presenting the viewpoints and perspectives from animal welfare and rights groups, focusing on TNR or euthanasia as the only viable cat management strategies when many alternatives exist and often have greater support from experts, and discussing the impacts of cats on birds and small mammals but not reptiles or amphibians. A free Plain Language Summary can be found within the Supporting Information of this article.

U.S. foreign policy interests and themes about India in the U.S. press after the Cold War

ABSTRACTThis qualitative study researched portrayal of India in the U.S. press after the Cold War. It studied whether the U.S. media portrayed India in accordance with policy stances of the U.S. government. To do so, this study took into account 143 stories about India from The New York Times and uncovered qualitative themes about India from the news stories. The research used Indexing theory. The study found that common themes about India in the U.S. press were supportive of India and that the press portrayal was consistent with U.S. policy stance on India after the Cold War. The study concluded that Indexing theory finds support from this study. Findings of the study have ramifications for press-state relations in the U.S., because in 2019 the United States was ranked only 48th in the World Press Freedom Index.

The Short-Lived Epidemic of Botulism From Commercially Canned Foods in the United States, 1919 to 1925.

In 1919, three deadly outbreaks of botulism caused by consumption of canned olives packed in California captured national headlines. In all of the outbreaks, which occurred in separate locales, unsuspecting people died after consuming tainted food during a banquet or family meal. The press's sensational portrayal of canned food as hazardous aroused alarm among consumers at a time when commercial canning was becoming more common. Intent on restoring the image of their product as safe and wholesome, canning industry leaders funded a "botulism commission" of scientific experts in 1919 to investigate how to systematically eliminate the threat of botulism that had imperiled their business. The commissioners identified the scientific reasons for the outbreaks, and on the basis of their findings, the California Department of Public Health issued explicit recommendations for sterilization procedures intended to ensure safety. However, the department did not mandate inspections for all canneries. When commercially packed fruits and vegetables continued to cause botulism, industry leaders voluntarily backed a cannery inspection act to legally require all California canners to possess appropriate equipment and follow scientifically validated sterilization procedures. After the California legislature approved the act in 1925, canneries were inspected, regulations were enforced, and no further outbreaks occurred. This botulism epidemic is an example of a disease outbreak that was controlled when business interests became aligned with public health goals. The press's portrayal of afflicted persons as innocent victims and worthy citizens galvanized businessmen to implement safeguards to protect consumers from botulism intoxication. To preserve their customer base and salvage their corporations, leaders of the canning industry acknowledged the public health threat of their unregulated procedures and acted on the recommendations of scientists.

Making corpus data visible: visualising text with research intermediaries

Researchers using corpora can visualise their data and analyses using a growing number of tools. Visualisations are especially valuable in environments where researchers communicate and work with public-facing partners under the auspices of ‘knowledge exchange’ or ‘impact’, and corpus data are more available thanks to digital methods. However, although the field of corpus linguistics continues to generate its own range of techniques, it largely remains orientated towards finding ways for academics to communicate results directly with other academics rather than with or through groups outside universities. Also, there is a lack of discussion about how communication, motivations and values also feature in the process of making corpus data visible. My argument is that these sociocultural and practical factors also influence visualisation outputs alongside technical aspects. I draw upon two corpus-based projects about press portrayal of migrants, conducted by an intermediary organisation that links university researchers with users outside academia. Analysing these projects' visualisation outputs in their organisational and communication contexts produces key lessons for researchers wanting to visualise text; consider the aims and values of partners; develop communication strategies that acknowledge different areas of expertise; and link visualisation choices with wider project objectives.

War on the Basepaths: The Definitive Biography of Ty Cobb by Tim Hornbaker

Reviewed by: War on the Basepaths: The Definitive Biography of Ty Cobb by Tim Hornbaker III C. Paul Rogers Tim Hornbaker. War on the Basepaths: The Definitive Biography of Ty Cobb. New York: Sports Publishing, 2015. 356 pp. Cloth, $24.99. Laying claim to penning the definitive biography of any important historical figure appears rather rash, given the rather fluid nature of historical and biographical research and the ability of new generations of researchers to uncover new material. But that is what Tim Hornbaker's new work on Ty Cobb asserts. Perhaps it is implicit by the use of the term "definitive" that the author really means "definitive so far," since Cobb is certainly a subject that will elicit further serious study (In fact, another substantial biography of Cobb was published in 2015: Charles Leershen's Ty Cobb: A Terrible Beauty [New York: Simon and Schuster, 2015]). Certainly most baseball historians would agree that to date, Charles Alexander's masterful 1984 biography Ty Cobb would fit that description. Without, however, comparing Alexander's biography (or others who might lay claim to the designation) to Hornbaker's, suffice to say that Hornbaker's book is an excellent look at Cobb's controversial life. It is a balanced work that reveals the complexity of the man with his many faults and his attributes, although it would be difficult to claim the latter compare to the former. For example, the standard, largely uneducated perception is that Cobb was a ruthless competitor who would do anything to win, including spiking opponents while on the bases almost at will. Hornbaker reveals, however, that Cobb did indeed have a conscience when it came to the opposition. In September 1909, he spiked Philadelphia Athletics shortstop Jack Barry while trying to steal second. The wound required four stitches to close, and afterwards Cobb was "visibly affected," refusing to eat and telling the press how sorry he was (94). Hornbacker also points out that, in spite of the contemporary press's portrayal of Cobb as "a raging, conceited baseball fiend," Cobb was unfailingly polite, humble, and almost shy when giving interviews or speeches (113). But he commonly caused resentment from his teammates on the Detroit Tigers by showing up late to spring training, if at all, and not infrequently arriving late for games. And although his will to win was legendary, teammates sometimes believed Cobb's ego got in the way of the team. That is, he sometimes strove to win games all by himself at bat or on the base paths, instead of incorporating his skills into a team effort to win. According to Hornbacker's research, this feeling was particularly acute during the 1910 season when Cobb was seeking the batting championship in a tight race against Napoleon Lajoie, with the winner to receive a Chalmers [End Page 195] automobile. His longtime teammate and frequent adversary Sam Crawford in particular felt like there was "too much Cobb" and that Cobb's zest for the batting title "spoiled teamwork as a result" (112). For his part, Cobb, with all his bluster and daring between the lines, was quite sensitive to criticism and especially being called "swell-headed," which presumably meant putting his own accomplishments ahead of the team (112–13). Cobb's sensitivity and hair-trigger temper resulted in any number of off-field confrontations and fisticuffs, which Hornbaker ably documents. Although it was a different time and ballplayer fights were much more common, Cobb was in many more than his share, almost all of which he won decisively. Several off-field incidents involved African Americans. The Georgia Peach was certainly a racist as a product of his southern upbringing, but he seems to have taken it to the extreme. It didn't play very well in Detroit and landed him in legal trouble more than once, but there is little evidence that Cobb's attitude towards blacks changed, at least during his playing career. In spite of an inflammatory press and Cobb's own substantial efforts to fuel those flames, as his playing career wore on he became regarded as one of the game's elder statesmen. Almost unimaginably given his off-field encounters, Cobb was honored...

How mainstream Iranian newspapers portray the West: the influence of anti-Westernism and anti-Americanism

The present paper is about the role of media in creating anti-American and anti-Western sentiments amongst Iranians. It studies how anti-Americanism has evolved in Iran and how, as an ideological representation, has influenced the press portrayal of the West in the country. It also identifies dominant frames in newspaper reporting of the West and indicates how the perception of reality and meaning-construction work in mainstream Iranian newspapers. For this purpose, content analysis and critical discourse analysis are used to analyse sampled news items published during Reformism (1997–2001) and Conservatism (2005–2009) in Iran. The current study also evaluates the impact of political affiliation of newspapers (as the first independent variable) and the political period in which they are published (as the second independent variable) on the representation of the West (as the dependent variable) in Iran. The findings of the present study are yet another contribution to study the West within the context of Occidentalism.

Bad news from an aberrant city: a critical analysis of the British press's portrayal of organised crime and the refuse crisis in Naples

This article examines the coverage of Naples since 2000 in the Guardian and the Independent, paying particular attention to their portrayal of the Camorra and the refuse crisis. It argues that this coverage was not simply riddled with stereotypes but was also characterised by significant inaccuracies and omissions. Analysts in Italy have detailed how the trash emergency in 2008 was the outcome of corporate malpractice and institutional complicity and that organised crime, although intent on exploiting the situation, was not a determining factor. The British press, instead, tended to conflate the breakdown of the urban waste cycle with the dumping of toxic waste and, by inverting cause and effect, to point the blame at the Camorra. These accounts, it is argued, are partially explained by the very nature of foreign news that seeks out dramatic and clearcut stories for an otherwise disinterested audience. They also reflect the heightened interest in the Camorra following the Secondigliano War and the English translation of Roberto Saviano's Gomorrah. However, the article suggests that it is the press's assumption that Naples is already an ‘out of the ordinary’ urban setting that ultimately precludes the possibility of an informed coverage of the city and its predicaments.

Researching ‘teachers in the news’: the portrayal of teachers in the British national and regional press

An outline of frameworks for conceptualising and analysing news media roles in the representation of teachers, is followed by a discussion of quantitative and qualitative approaches to the study of news coverage. An argument is made for the benefit of using corpus linguistic tools within the overall conceptual focus on lexical and syntactical structures offered by critical discourse analysis. Findings are presented from a comprehensive study of the press portrayal of teachers and education. Focusing on the portrayal of teachers in news headline coverage, the study shows a considerable lexical and syntactic change between 1991 and 2005 in the public/news representation of teachers, broadly from a negative view of teachers as troublesome to a more positive emphasis on teachers as a hard-working profession besieged by mounting pressures.

“At the Stroke of the Midnight Hour”: Lord Mountbatten and the British Media at Indian Independence

This article examines the portrayal of Indian Independence in the British media with particular attention to the orchestration of official publicity by Lord Mountbatten and his press attaché, Alan Campbell-Johnson. The British press was able to portray Independence as a British achievement, arising almost organically out of its long-term policy and vindicating British rule. The article also explores press portrayal of Indian leaders, the Princely States, the role of the Commonwealth and communal violence.

Who makes acquisitions? CEO overconfidence and the market's reaction

Does CEO overconfidence help to explain merger decisions? Overconfident CEOs over-estimate their ability to generate returns. As a result, they overpay for target companies and undertake value-destroying mergers. The effects are strongest if they have access to internal financing. We test these predictions using two proxies for overconfidence: CEOs’ personal over-investment in their company and their press portrayal. We find that the odds of making an acquisition are 65% higher if the CEO is classified as overconfident. The effect is largest if the merger is diversifying and does not require external financing. The market reaction at merger announcement ( - 90 basis points) is significantly more negative than for non-overconfident CEOs ( - 12 basis points). We consider alternative interpretations including inside information, signaling, and risk tolerance.

Corporate Financial Policies with Overconfident Managers*

Many financing choices of US corporations remain puzzling even after accounting for standard determinants such as taxes, bankruptcy costs, and asymmetric information. We propose that managerial beliefs help to explain the remaining variation across and within firms, including variation in debt conservatism and in pecking-order behavior. Managers who believe that their company is undervalued view external financing as overpriced, especially equity financing. As a result, they display pecking-order preferences for internal financing over debt and for debt over equity. They may also exhibit debt conservatism: While they prefer debt to equity, they still underutilize debt relative to its tax benefits. We test these hypotheses empirically, using late option exercise by the CEO as a measure of overconfidence. We find that, conditional on accessing public markets, CEOs who personally overinvest in their companies are significantly less likely to issue equity. They raise 33 cents more debt to cover an additional dollar of financing deficit than their peers. Moreover, the frequency with which they access any external finance (debt or equity) is significantly lower, resulting in debt conservatism. The results replicate when identifying managerial overconfidence based on press portrayal as confident or optimistic. We conclude that managerial overconfidence helps to explain variation in corporate financial policies.

Corporate Financial Policies With Overconfident Managers

Many financing choices of US corporations remain puzzling even after accounting for standard determinants such as taxes, bankruptcy costs, and asymmetric information. We propose that managerial beliefs help to explain the remaining variation across and within firms, including variation in debt conservatism and in pecking-order behavior. Managers who believe that their company is undervalued view external financing as overpriced, especially equity financing. As a result, they display pecking-order preferences for internal financing over debt and for debt over equity. They may also exhibit debt conservatism: While they prefer debt to equity, they still underutilize debt relative to its tax benefits. We test these hypotheses empirically, using late option exercise by the CEO as a measure of overconfidence. We find that, conditional on accessing public markets, CEOs who personally overinvest in their companies are significantly less likely to issue equity. They raise 33 cents more debt to cover an additional dollar of financing deficit than their peers. Moreover, the frequency with which they access any external finance (debt or equity) is significantly lower, resulting in debt conservatism. The results replicate when identifying managerial overconfidence based on press portrayal as confident or optimistic. We conclude that managerial overconfidence helps to explain variation in corporate financial policies.

The “Forgotten” 1918 Influenza Epidemic and Press Portrayal of Public Anxiety

This study explores media portrayal of collective “American anxiety” by examining magazine coverage of a domestic crisis that should have made Americans anxious, the 1918 influenza epidemic, to seek references to anxiety, and to try to understand why this scourge, which killed more people than did World War I, has been lost to public memory. The coverage suggests that the nature of epidemic itself offers clues to why it has been virtually “forgotten.” It had no beginning or end, no definable enemies, no amplified heroes who fit an early twentieth-century male definition of the concept, and no institutionalized commemoration.

Attitudes toward advertising held by the boomers and the busters: some facts and myths

In the United States one of the common perceptions of young consumers, called the baby busters or the Xers, is that they are more critical of advertising in general than the baby boomers. Unfortunately, however, little empirical evidence is available to back up this perception. This study compares the boomers and the busters in terms of their general attitude towards advertising and specific advertising beliefs. Contrary to popular press reports that busters have a more negative attitude towards advertising than baby boomers, no significant differences were found in the two groups' general attitude towards advertising and in four of five ad-belief factors. In fact, the busters were found to have more favourable beliefs about advertising's utility as a source of hedonic amusement, challenging the popular press portrayal of the busters as ‘cynical gripers’. On the other hand, consistent with the popular press reports, regression analysis showed that the busters are knowing consumers and they are perhaps mor...

Femininity, responsibility, and the technological imperative: discourses on breast cancer in the Australian press.

The manner in which the popular press represents health issues influences, and is demonstrative of, societal attitudes toward illnesses and those who suffer from them. Cancer is one of the most feared diseases in modern society, and breast cancer attacks women at the bodily site where notions of femininity intersect. This article examines the discourses surrounding breast cancer as represented in the Australian press in the period between 1987 and 1990. It is argued that the press's portrayal of breast cancer during that time drew upon dominant cultural metaphors and discourses concerning femininity, the individual's responsibility for illness, and medical and technological dominance.

Press portrayal of African American and white United States representatives

This content analysis examines nine major metropolitan daily newspapers to determine how they portrayed African American and white members of the United States House of Representatives from 1979 to 1983. Discriminant analysis reveals that in several areas of press portrayal, newspapers differentiate the way they present African American and white political incumbents.

Press Portrayal of Black Officials

Press Portrayal of Black Officials