The Cognitive Impact of Television News: Production Attributes and Information Reception

222 Pages·2015·0.9 MB·English

by  Barrie Gunter (auth.)

The Cognitive Impact of Television News
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The Cognitive Impact of
Television News
Production Attributes and Information
Reception
Barrie Gunter
©BarrieGunter2015
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2015 978-1-137-46881-9
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Gunter,Barrie.
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pages cm
Includesbibliographicalreferencesandindex.
1. Televisionbroadcastingofnews. 2. Television—Production
anddirection. 3. Massmedia—Psychologicalaspects. 4. Television
viewers. I. Title.
PN4784.T4G842015
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Contents
Preface vi
1 HowMuchDoWeValueTelevisionNews? 1
2 DoWeRememberMuchfromTelevisionNews? 15
3 HowDoesTelevisionComparewithOtherMedia? 38
4 AreSomeTelevisionNewsStoriesEasiertoRemember? 53
5 DoesTelevisionTellStoriesinaMemorableWay? 71
6 DoPicturesHelporHinderOurNewsMemories? 96
7 IsTelevisionNewsPresentedTooFast? 117
8 IsTelevisionNewsPackagedHelpfully? 133
9 DoWeNeedtoReceiveTelevisionNewsMoreThanOnce? 145
10 CanTelevisionNewsBeEntertainingandMemorable? 156
References 170
Index 197
v
Preface
This book is about the news on television and its audience. Its focal
point is whether televised news effectively gets the news across to the
public or not. We might think that the news is informative – after
all, isn’t that what it is made to be? When we look more closely at
what people actually take away with them from specific news broad-
casts, however, this common sense view is challenged. Looking more
closely at the news on television, in the sense taken by this analysis,
entailsassessingthroughformaltestshowmuchviewerscanremember
of what they have seen and heard in news bulletins. What do view-
ers learn from single bulletins and from multiple bulletins over time?
On some occasions, these ‘memories’ can be measured in terms of rec-
ollectionsoffactualinformationandonotheroccasionsasimpressions
or perceptions that news consumers hold about specific public figures,
objects,organisations,eventsorissues.Aswewillsee,ifweaskviewers
whether they learn from televised news, most will usually claim that,
of course, they do. When we test more formally for the types of infor-
mationtheyhaveacquiredfollowingtheirexposuretonewsbroadcasts,
independentlymeasuredlearningandmemoryoutcomesdonotalways
confirmthesepersonalclaims.
Majoropinionpollsconductedovermanydecadesincountriessuch
astheUKandtheUS,forexample,haverevealedthatmostpeoplenom-
inate television as their most important source of news. In these polls,
membersofthepublicalsooftenobservethatnewsprovisionisoneof
the most important functions of television. Most people believe they
receive ‘most of their news’ from television. Most regard television as
their most trusted news source. Hence, in developed democratic soci-
eties at least, the public attach great credibility to televised news. They
valueitforitsperceivedaccuracy,itsbalanceofcoverageofmajorissues,
its impartiality and objectivity in the way specific stories are reported,
and for the immediacy of its coverage that not only keeps them up to
datewiththelatestnewsdevelopmentsintheworld,butcanalsomake
themseemlikeeyewitnessestosomeeventsastheyhappen.
News professionals will acknowledge these attributes as well. They
will claim that the news outputs they produce are objective, designed
to bring to people information about events and issues that is current
andrelevant;andthattheirstorytellingtechniquesaredesignednotjust
vi
Preface vii
to provide accurate accounts of news events but also to enhance wider
publicunderstandingoftheimportantissuesoftheday.
This book will not claim that television fails to deliver on what the
public expects and the professionals claim. There is ample evidence
that people benefit greatly from their exposure to televised news. The
public – especially in open, democratic societies that value freedom of
speechandallowthenewsmediathelatitudetoreportwithoutgovern-
ment constraints or censorship (beyond the boundaries of reasonable
‘public interest’ legislation) – are kept informed by sources that can
largely be trusted to get the facts straight. Such news sources usually
adheretocodesofprofessionalpracticethatrequirethemtoplaceobjec-
tivityinnewsreportingaboveallelse.Incountrieswithmoreautocratic
political regimes, the news diets fed to people can be both selective
and biased from the outset. Even in open democracies, selectivity and
bias in news broadcasting can still occur but tend to be underpinned
orshapedbyprofessionalandcommercialreasonsratherthanpolitical
imperatives.
The subjective perceptions of viewers, however, can sometimes give
a misleading impression of the informational effectiveness of televised
newsandevenonethatiscompletelywrongifwesetastrictbenchmark
of ‘learning’ based on viewers’ abilities to produce accurate personal
accounts of the reports of events they witnessed in specific bulletins.
Wemightalsofrequentlydiscoverthatmostpeoplelackasoundknowl-
edge of topics that have been covered in the news. As we will see, in
surveyswhereviewersweretelephonedathomewithinanhourortwo
ofanevening’stelevisedbulletin,mostofthestoriesthatwerereported
wereforgotten.Evenwhenviewerswereforewarnedthattheywouldbe
called,theydidnotfaremuchbetter.
We can, of course, challenge the validity of this type of research by
arguing that such ‘recall tests’ put viewers unfairly on the spot and do
not provide a sufficient opportunity to explore the full extent of their
news memories or of their wider current affairs knowledge. This crit-
icism has some currency. We do not simply remember isolated facts,
which we then place in a storage device in our brains that we might
label as ‘news memory’ and from which we can then pluck answers to
questionsinnewsquizzes.Itissometimesnecessarytousemoresubtle
approaches to coax complex memories to the surface. Such knowledge
canthenbeutilisedtoensureweticktherightboxesinanewsknowl-
edgetestortoarticulateinourownwordsdescriptiveandexplanatory
accountsofnewsstorieswewitnessedontelevision.
viii Preface
The evidence for the failure of news stories to penetrate our brains
in subsequently usable ways becomes more compelling when memory
lapses still occur despite careful prompting and probing. More serious
still is the evidence that facts can get mixed up from different stories
andaricherunderstandingofeventsthatgoesbeyondsimplefactsfails
toemerge.Indeed,thenewscansometimesevencreatefalsememories
of what actually happened in specific reported events if presentation
practicesleadviewersawayfromthecoreaspectsofastory.
Ofcourse,itisimportanttorecognisewhatmightbehappeningtous
whenwewatchthenewsontelevision.Itisagrossoversimplificationto
think of watching a televised bulletin as some kind of completely new
learningexperienceeverytimewetunein.Instead,broadcastnewspro-
vides us with updates on topics about which we might already possess
some knowledge. This knowledge might have been obtained through
a variety of sources. Televised news does not operate in an informa-
tionvacuum.Itformspartofamuchbiggerenvironmentinwhichthe
flowofnewsoccursthroughavarietyofinformationchannelsthatalso
includenewspapers,magazines,radiobroadcastsand,thesedays,other
sourcesofinformationthatcanbelocatedviatheinternet.Ourknowl-
edgeoftopicsthatgetreportedinthenewsmightalsoderivefromour
moreformaleducationalexperiencesatschool,fromprivatereadingand
fromconversationswehavehadwithotherpeople.
Pre-existing topic knowledge has emerged as an important factor in
relationtotherichnessofnewmemoriesthatareforgedoutoftelevised
(and other media) news experiences. If a televised news story concern-
ing the impact of a new government policy on the performance of the
nationaleconomyispresented,itmightcontaintechnicalelementsthat
have meaning only for those viewers who possess some prior working
knowledgeofeconomics.Forviewerslackingthisknowledge,thetech-
nicaltermscontainedinanewsreportwilllackmeaningandiftheyare
centraltothecomprehensionofthestory,theycouldrenderitrelatively
meaningless to those viewers. Viewers who have studied economics,
however, might possess a rich knowledge base within which this new
information can be embedded and interpreted. Hence, much stronger
memoriescanbelaiddownaboutthestorythatcanalsobemoreeasily
retrievedatalatertimewhenneeded.
Some losses of information from televised news, therefore, can
undoubtedly be pinned at the door of viewers themselves and their
lack of broader relevant knowledge that could enhance their abilities
to process complex new information delivered to them by broadcast
Preface ix
journalists. As we will see, there is corroborative evidence from for-
mal research inquiries to confirm this last observation. What has also
emerged from the much wider body of scientific research evidence on
audiences and broadcast news, however, is that when news bulletin
informationfailstopenetrateviewers’memories,thereareotherreasons
forthisoutcomethathavenothingtodowithviewersthemselves.
As already noted, news professionals – that is, the journalists who
report and write specific news stories and the editors who take deci-
sions about which stories to include in a programme and how the
programme itself will be organised and presented – take pride in their
professionalcodesofpractice.Intelevisionbroadcasting,thereisoften
legislationimposedbygovernment,throughregulators,thatsetsdown
standards for news reporting. The necessity for such controlling codes
of practices is underpinned by the belief that television is a powerful
communicationsmediumthatcanexertsignificantinfluenceoverpub-
licunderstandingofcurrenteventsandissuesandoverpublicopinion.
In addition, journalists learn practices that are designed to ensure that
the highest standards of news reporting are maintained. Their profes-
sionalandtradebodiesusuallydevisetheirownethicalcodesofpractice
thatareinturndesignedtoensurethatqualifiedjournalistsdonotstray
fromthestandardsexpectedofthem.
All news reporting follows a cycle. This means that news outputs,
regardless of the news medium, must meet delivery deadlines. These
deadlinescanvarywiththefrequencywithwhichspecificnewsoutputs
areusuallypublished.Hence,monthlymagazineshavelongertimelines
fordeliverythandoweeklymagazines.Weeklynewspapershavelonger
delivery timelines than do daily newspapers. With news broadcasting,
timelines might be weekly, daily or even hourly depending upon how
frequentlyspecificbroadcastsaretransmitted.
Inevitably, internal working practices of news organisations are
designedtoenableeffectivedeliveryofpublishedoutputsaccordingto
theirusualdeliverytimeline.Forthosenewsoutputsthatoperatewithin
short time cycles, specific organisational practices must be adopted to
ensurethenewsisdeliveredontime.Newsbroadcastersthataretasked
with delivering news bulletins several times a day operate with tried-
and-tested working practices that facilitate fast decision making and
observe specific rules concerning news story selections and styles of
delivery.
Broadcastnewsroomsareconfrontedonadailybasiswithmanymore
newsstoriesthantheyhavetheairtimeorspacetocover.Suchlimitsto
overall news outputs from broadcast newsrooms have been dissolved