Partisan and Structural Balance in Newspaper Coverage of U.S. Senate Races in 2004 with Female Nominees

Abstract

Nine newspapers covering U.S. Senate races in 2004 were mostly evenhanded in the space and prominence given candidates. Reporter gender, newsroom diversity, and newspaper size were associated with partisan imbalance giving more favorable treatment to Democrats. The partisanship of a story's lead predicted the story's structural imbalance, regardless of the party the imbalance favored. However, story partisan and structural imbalances were negligibly related, suggesting that news processing conventions rather than journalistic partisanship produced the imbalance.

Sesgo partidista en medios informativos. Una crítica metodológica y propuesta

“…En el ámbito del periodismo político se entiende por sesgo la tendencia sistemática a beneficiar a unos actores o posiciones en detrimento de otros, mediante la selección de una fuente que produce información incompleta sobre temas asociados a los mismos -la dimensión de acceso (in)equitativo-o a través de tratamientos editoriales preferenciales o bien desfavorecedores -la dimensión de tratamiento (des)equilibrado- (Fico, Freedman & Love, 2006;McQuail, 1998). Tal práctica cobra una dimensión política importante al constituir una transgresión a las normas de imparcialidad y objetividad del desempeño periodístico, entendida este último como el equilibrio en la presentación de las diferentes facetas de un tema o acontecimiento, neutralidad en tono y forma, contención emocional, separación entre hechos y opinión, y ausencia de segundas intenciones (Christians, Glasser, McQuail & White, 2009;McQuail, 1998;Schudson, 2001).…”

Gendering Leadership in Vietnamese Media: A Role Congruity Study on News Content and Journalists’ Perception of Female and Male Leaders

“…Many studies have examined the depiction of leaders in the news through a gendered lens, but they are not methodologically diverse. While they have produced insightful results, most used content analysis to investigate the unfair treatment of news sources (Fico, Freedman, & Love, 2006; Matud, Rodríguez, & Espinosa, 2011; Ross, 2007; Schwartz, 2011). This study adds to the literature by surveying Vietnamese journalists on their perceptions of female and male leader sources and analyzing news content.…”

Religious news and controversies in Central Asia: a case study of a Western ‘Christian Initiative’ news service

“…Balance, in part, concerns content treatment, such as space and prominence given to each side. The prominence of one side over another also has implications for media fairness and placement of a quote -how high it appears in a story -also determines the prominence of the quoted sources (Fico et al, 2006;Carter et al, 2002). In view of the pro-religious rights orientation of Forum 18, we arrive at:…”