Study investigates individuals who receive their information about mental illness primarily from. Results reveal that the amount of television watched per week was significantly and positively related to intolerance and that the type of show watched accounted for significant variance in measures of tolerance toward people with mental illness.…

Contributes to research on schema theory and media effects by examining how violence is portrayed in comedy programs. Finds a high rate of violence (especially verbal forms) on comedy programs; and the combination of humor, minor acts of violence, and program context tend to trivialize its presence. Suggests that viewers' schema for comedy uses…

Tests the hypothesis that processing strategy moderates the effect of television viewing on social perceptions of undergraduate students (cultivation effect). Examines views on prevalence of crime, occupations, affluence, and marital discord. Indicates that processing strategy moderated the cultivation effect such that cultivation effects were…

The mass media contribution to education politics is explored through the application of a pluralistic theoretical framework to evidence connected with the making of an episode of a U.K. current affairs television program. The episode addressed a politically contentious educational issue but proved controversial in itself. Several sources…

In 1970, the Federal Communications Commission passed the Prime Time Access Rule, which directly affected the participation of the three commercial television networks in the production, transmission, and syndication of prime time programs. The result of this decision, as modified over the years since 1970, has shaped the television industry with…

Investigating persons viewed on local television news (other than anchors and reporters), a study examined 810 local television news stories from 1986 to 1987 from a national sample drawn from the files of a news consultant, and 543 stories (34 newscasts) from Cincinnati, Ohio, network affiliate newscasts in the summer of 1987. The unit of…

A study compared the organizational styles of television station program directors (PDs) against indicators of market and department size, personnel stability, job satisfaction, and productivity. Researchers used the four types of management styles used by Likert: exploitative authoritarian, benevolent authoritarian, consultative, and…

A study that examined consonance among the three major television networks' evening news programs for the period 1973 through 1981 used multiple criteria to assess long-term patterns of network similarity in news selection and treatment. A random sample was drawn, using one constructed week of five weekdays per quarter of the nine years and…

Concludes that while blacks appeared in approximately 25 percent of the news in a given time period, the majority of the time they were seen but not heard in television newscasts. (RB)

On the premise that a gap has developed between the newsworthiness of the national political party conventions and the television network resources allocated to cover them, the three major networks' coverage of the 1980 Democratic and Republican national conventions was analyzed to document patterns that influence the networks' portrayal of party…

A study was initiated to answer questions concerning television programing during "people's time" in a medium-sized market. "People's time" is defined as local prime time from 4:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. as contrasted with prime or network time and is considered a time when local broadcasters have an opportunity to serve their audience's…

A great deal of research has examined the effects of the racial composition of advertisements on their acceptance by the black consumer. From this literature two antithetical findings have emerged: (1) television commercials that use black models are more meaningful to black viewers than are those using white models, and (2) black models in…

Data from three representative national surveys were studied to determine to what extent profiles of television viewers of different levels of viewing frequency fit with expectations based on theory and earlier research. A group of 4,552 respondents were surveyed in 1975, 1976, and 1978 by personal interviews and were classified as to status as…

A study was conducted to determine whether dance-trained, television-trained, and regular television viewing audiences would evaluate different approaches to televising dance differently. Three versions of a dance performance were videotaped: (1) version A, a one-camera, one-shot recording; (2) version B, a two-camera, real-time-edited approach,…

A study was conducted in which half-hour segments of prime-time network dramatic programing were tabulated for such violence-related items as: the seriousness and significance of violence, the number of violent actions in the program, and the duration of violence. Other factors considered were: audience size, share of audience, program duration,…