CREDIBILITY OF SIGNED VS. UNSIGNED EDITORIALS

by

STEVE MONK, B.A.

A THESIS

IN

MASS COMMUNICATIONS

Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of Texas Tech University in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for

the Degree of

MASTER OF ARTS

Approved

Accepted

December, 1978

i9fø

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I am deeply indebted to Dr. Alexis S. Tan for his direc-

tion of this thesis and to the other members of my committee,

Dr. William F. Dean and Dr. Phillip E. Isett, for their efforts

I would also like to thank Joe Hughes, editorial writer for

the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal for his advice and assistance

in preparation of the experiment.

11

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ii

LIST OF TABLES v

I. INTRODUCTION 1

Problem and Justification for Study 3

II. REVIEW OF LITERATURE 6

Background in Mass Communication Theory . . . 7

Research Applied to Newspapers 10

Research Applied to Editorial Writing . . . . 12

III. METHOD AND PROCEDURES 16

The Laboratory Experiment 16

The Pre-test 17

The Editorial 17

The Post-test 19

Analysis 20

The Telephone Survey 20

The Survey Questionnaire 20

The Sample 21

Analysis 23

IV. RESULTS 24

Laboratory Experiment Results 24

Demographics 24

Media Usage 24

Political Leanings 25

Attitude Scales 25 • • •

1 1 1

ANOVA Results 25

Descriptive Statistics 26

Telephone Survey Results 31

Demographics 31

Media Usage 31

Analysis 32

Descriptive Statistics 35

V. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS 3 7

Summary 3 7

Limitations of the Study 38

Conclusions 40

Recommendations for future Research 41

LIST OF REFERENCES 44

APPENDIX A 47

APPENDIX B 50

APPENDIX C 51

APPENDIX D 53

APPENDIX E 55

IV

LIST OF TABLES

TABLE

1. Credibility Mean Scores 27

2. Analysis of Variance Credibility by Signature 28

3. Crosstabulation of Believability by Understanding of Signature 33

4. Pearson Correlation Coefficients 34

CHAPTER I Introduction

Within the past few years, a quiet revolution has been going on

within the newspaper industry. It has nothing to do with the advent

of computer typesetting, which although revolutionary, has been well

documented. The quieter, more subtle revolution was not begun by the

newspaper industry itself, but by its constituency.

Newspaper readers, like consumers in virtually all areas, are de-

manding more accountability from reporters and editors. The evidence

of this "consumer movement" is clear in the number of newspapers that

have added ombudsmen for reader complaints and "op-ed" pages to expand

the purpose of the traditional letters to the editor.

Perhaps the best evidence comes from the editor of "Rolling Stone,"

Jann Wenner, as quoted in the 1977 report of the Associated Press Man-

aging Editors' Committee on the Changing Newspaper. (APME Redbook,

1977).

"Newspapers are boring and irrelevant to people's lives; full of lies and misinformation. Most follow the lead of the Eastern Establishment press..(publishing) stories no one cares about. It's just classic B.S. Everyone knows that an AP, New York Times or UPI account of the Mideast or a Presidential press conference is just hogwash put out by someone else.... Everyone realizes it's a sham." (p.269)

Though committee members may violently disagree with Wenner's

conclusions, they are no longer ignoring the success of his publica-

tion. The coramittee report that contains Wenner's coraments addresses

ways to lure the "youth raarket" (loosely defined in the report as

readers between 21 and 34) back to the daily newspaper.

However, despite the moveraent toward a more "consumer oriented"

newspaper, some traditions persist that seem to work against that goal.

One of these traditions — a tradition so pervasive as to be almost

beyond question in raost newspapers — is that of unsigned editorial

opinion.

Acceptance of unsigned editorials is so universal that educators

teach the practice as an axiom. As an example, Rhodin (1967) seems

to breathe life into the newspaper itself in his "secret of a good

editorial page" when he implies that the page itself, instead of the

writer, has "personality." He defines that personality as "how the

paper thinks, the way it looks at things, what makes it happy, what

makes it sad, what sets it apart from others (p. 82)." And what of

the mere writer's own opinion? According to Rhodin's guidelines, it

"should be an informed one, and it should reflect the view of the

newspaper (p. 72)." No guidance is given on how one communicates

with a newpaper.

Later texts seem to hedge on this definition of the editorial

writer as a naraeless conduit of the newspaper's opinion. Hohenberg

(1978), for example, admits that, "By their very nature, editorials

generally reflect the taste and character of the writer as well as the

flavor of the newspaper (p. 525)." Hohenberg, however, stops short of

recoramending that this personalization should be reflected tangibly

by a signature.

Another text, this one by Harriss, Leiter, & Johnson (1977),

though pointing out the opportunity for individuality among editorial-

ists ("Then the editorial writer is free to add his own interpretation

(p. 360),") the authors still hold to Rhodin's idea that the editorial

is the newspaper itself speaking ("The newspaper's appraisal of local,

state, national and international events can be offered effectively

in this manner (p. 357).") The authors also list signatures, or the

lack thereof, as one way to differentiate between editorials and

colurans.

The pervasiveness of the principle of unsigned editorials may

best be seen, however, in the rating booklets of the National Scholas-

tic Press Association (1976): "editorials, (statements of staff or

editorial board opinion; they should not be signed) (p. 19)."

The Problem and Justification for Study

With the aforementioned consumer expectations, perhaps the tirae

has come to question what has for so long been accepted on faith—

that readers understand the purpose and the content of editorials.

The overall questions might be stated: Do readers consider newspaper

editorials credible sources of information? And what can editorialists

do to increase that credibility?

This study will address only one narrow part of those overall

questions: Would signing editorial opinion raake it more credible?

To understand the importance of credibility in editorials, one

must consider the purpose of editorials. Though, by definition, an

editorial only "presents the opinion or comment of the periodical

(American College Dictionary, 1968)," most editorials urge readers to

agree with that opinion.

In his introduction to a paper on reader persuasibility, Stone-

cipher (1976) brings this point into focus:

"The editorial writer is engaged in one of the most challenging and interesting aspects of the communications process — the art of persuasion. ... The successful ed-itorialist, therefore, is a persuader, though he may on occasion be faced with overwhelming odds in the raarketplace where his editorial raessages may often miss their mark or, worse yet, be completely ignored by the reader." (p. 36)

This study will deal to some degree with persuasiveness, but the

key area to be addressed is credibility as a vital first step in the

process of persuasion.

In another paper on how to make editorials more persuasive, Stone-

cipher (1975) again summarized the importance of credibility in the

overall purpose of the editorial:

"Credibility is to a newspaper editorialist what virtue is to a woman — a lack of it tends to tarnish his reputa-tion and diminish his effectiveness. There are strong in-dications, if one believes the media critics, that credi-bility — already in short supply in the political arena — is also hampering the mass media, including the newspaper editorialist and columnist." (p. 43)

Again, it is recognized that credibility is but one of the many

variables having an effect on persuasiveness. Though the relationship

between credibility and persuasiveness will be examined through a review

of relevant research, the research conducted here will attempt to mini-

mize such variables in order to study better the area of source credi-

bility and what effect signatures have on that credibility.

Specifically then, this study will, through a laboratory experi-

ment and a telephone survey, attempt to determine: 1.) whether or not

the "average" reader notices the signature on an editorial; 2.) whether

or not the reader realizes why editorials are normally not signed; 3.)

whether, if he notices the signature, the inclusion will cause him to

give any more credibility to the opinion and facts expressed; and 4.)

whether such added credibility will cause any change of opinion.

CHAPTER II

REVIEW OF LITERATURE

Though an extensive review of the literature has produced no studies

dealing specifically with editorial credibility as correlated to signed

editorials, related research may provide some clues on that relation-

ship.

This review will begin with a broad background in mass communica-

tions research dealing with persuasion and opinion change, move toward

more specific studies dealing with credibility and finally enter the

area of credibility applied to news writing and reporting.

Perhaps the best place to begin is with the dictionary definition

of the word "persuade." According to The American College Dictionary

(1968), to persuade is "1. to prevail on (a person, etc.) by advice,

urging, reasons, inducements, etc, to do soraething. ... 2. to induce

to believe; convince." (p. 905)

As stated earlier, the editorialist is attempting to persuade.

The foregoing definition might be said to fit this situation in the

following way: The editorial writer is prevailing on his readers by

the use of reasons to believe as he does and, in some cases, to take

some action.

It should be noted that the editorialist, ideally, will use only

one of the four raethods raentioned in the definition to achieve his goal:

that of offering reasons. This is not to downplay the use of "urging"

through emotional appeals or "inducements" through a listing of the

advantages to be gained by taking the desired position. Both reason

and urging may be employed, but without the reasoned approach, such

urging probably does little good.

Background in Mass Coramunication Theory

If one takes the view of Schraram (1974), the work of the editor-

ialist as communicator can be easily separated from the work of others

in the newspaper and in the mass media as a whole. His goal is per-

suasive as opposed to that of the straight news writer and to some

extent, the columnist, whose aims are to inform; or of the feature

writer, whose primary aim is to entertain. The other function of

communication, by Schramm's model, is to instruct.

As Schramm points out, the difference in function is important to

how such communication must be presented. This is because persuasive

messages, while they must overcome all of the obstacles present in /

other forms of communication, must also/"set in motion some psychologi-V

cal dynamics by which the receiver may bring himself to yield to the

point of view advocated by the persuader."\(p. 44)

What are the "psychological dynamics" needed to produce this

"yielding" in the audience? Since these d^mamics obviously involve the

source, his message, the channel through which it is transmitted and the

audience to be persuaded, a mere cataloguing of all research would be

voluminous. Since the present study will seek to manipulate only the

source while all other factors — the message, the channel and the aud-

8

ience — will be controlled (e.g. through randomization of subjects,

use of the same message with control and experimental groups, etc.)

this review of literature will take into account only the processes

of source credibility. In other words, how important is source credi-

bility to communication in general and how essential is it when the

message is persuasive?

Kelman (1961), in his article on the processes of opinion change,

cited persuasive communications as one of three social influences

affecting opinion change (the other two being prestige suggestion and

small-group interaction). In the opinion-change process, he distin-

guished three processes of social influence: compliance — the adop-

tion of an opinion in hopes of a favorable reaction from the influencer;

identification — by which the receiver changes to "be more like" the

influencer; and internalization — the process by which an opinion

is adopted because it fits a pre-existing value system. Into this

third category, internalization, credibility is introduced as a nec-

essary antecedent.

In Kelman's view, if the source is expert and trustworthy (i.e.

likely both to know and tell the truth), the individual hearing the

persuasive message is raore likely to accept it into his own value

systera (although often the message is modified by the receiver to fit

pre-existing beliefs).

Much of the pioneering work in source credibility was done in the

early 1950s by Carl I Hovland. In one of those studies (Hovland &

Weiss, 1951), researchers transmitted, by means of booklets, identical

messages, substituting "trustworthy" and "untrustworthy" sources. The

articles used took affirmative or negative stands on four subjects

and were attributed to one of eight sources, four of which were con-

sidered to be of "high credibility" (such as the New England Journal

of Biology and Medicine, used as a source of an article on anti-

histamine drugs) and "low credibility" (such as a "widely syndicated

anti-labor, anti-New Deal, 'rightist' newspaper columnist" on a pub-

licized steel shortage).

Hovland and Weiss found that "subjects changed their opinion in

the direction advocated by the communicator in a significantly greater

number of cases when the material was attributed to a 'high credibility'

source than when attributed to a 'low credibility' source." The exper-

iment also found new evidence to support the existence of a "sleeper

effect,"|in which subjects tended to remember the information trans-

mitted longer than the trustworthiness of the source, thereby making

the message from "low credibility" sources more acceptable after the

passage of time.

Later study, however, by Aronson, Turner and Carlsmith (1963) in-

dicated that opinion change is also significantly affected by the dis-

crepancy of the message frora the audience's predispositions on a par-

ticular issue. Aronson et al. found that the rate of opinion change

is tied to the credibility of the communicator and the discrepancy

between his message and the receiver's preconceived notions on the

issue. These preconceptions have a significant effect, especially in

regard to the "mildly credible" coramunicator. After a point, the

credibility of the "mildly credible" source was lessened by his pre-

sentation of the discrepant message. The researchers attributed this

10

finding to Festinger's (1957) earlier theory of "cognitive dissonance."

Simply stated, they believed that the two factors, credibility

and discrepancy, interacted to create dissonance. The dissonance could

be resolved by changing one's opinion either on the raessage or on the

— « ^

credibility of the source. In the case of the "mildly credible" source,

it appears that subjects chose to resolve the dissonance by discounting

the source rather than by changing their opinions.

Research Applied to Newspapers

In applying these findings to newspaper editorials, an editor

would have to evaluate his own credibility, then determine how much his

persuasive message differs frora the beliefs of his readers, and on that

basis decide whether signing the editorial would enhance opinion change

or merely lessen his own credibility.

Regarding the research being undertaken here, the coraparison being

raade is not specifically between "high credibility" and "low credibil-

ity" sources, but between a naraed source and an anonymous one. The

assumption made by most newspaper raen is that the source of an editor-

ial is the newspaper itself. If this is true, will the newspaper's

credibility be greater than that of a named individual?

Some research reported by the American Newspaper Association (News

Research for Better Newspapers, Vol. 6) indicated that newspaper editors,

might be less than credible sources. Respondents in a California poll

were asked to rate various local, state and national politicians; local

11

newspaper editors; and a network news commentator as either "complete-

ly open and truthful," "truthful considering the responsibilities he

has," "sometimes doesn't tell everyting," or "often untruthful." Only

11 percent of the 534 respondents were willing to credit local editors

with complete truthfulness; 26 percent put them into the "truthful con-

sidering" category; another 31 percent said the editors sometimes didn't

tell everything and 16 percent thought they were often untruthful.

Other questions of media credibility were addressed by Westly and

Severin (1964). They found, briefly, that those who gave the highest

ranking to newspapers (over radio and television) in terms of "accur-

acy and truthfulness" were in the higher socio-economic levels, were

raore prone to be professional in occupation, college educated, more

upwardly mobile, considered themselves "middle class," tended to be

males in their 40s and 50s, were urban dwellers and were more geo-

phraphically mobile. In short, those giving the most credibility to

newspapers were also in the group that raight also be "opinion leaders"

in the community. It should be noted that the Westly and Severin study

concerned news material and not opinion-oriented raatter.

One of the raost coraprehensive surveys of mass media credibility

research in recent years (Greenberg & Roloff, 1974) concludes:

"Credibility is a function of the individual's per-ception of the number of alternatives presented by a given mass medium, of the visual verification of infor-mation possible through that medium, of the recency of information available, of the credibility of the indiv-idual journalists associated with presenting that in-formation and of the araount of inforraation desired by the individual." (p, 146)

Greenberg and Roloff make no attempt to deterraine which of these

12

factors should be most heavily weighted, leaving that question for

"subsequent research,"

Research Applied to Editorial Writing

In applying the principles involved in persuasion and credibility

to the case of editorial writing, one raust consider the effect on that

credibility of the medium — in particular, the editorial page itself.

In his study of public conceptions about the editorial page and

the forces that affect it, Hulteng (1969) surveyed 466 readers of four

newspapers in Oregon, asking only two questions: First, readers were

asked, "Which of the following, if any, do you think would be likely

to influence the editorial page opinion of the newspaper on a contro-

versial issue?" Editorial writers themselves were given credit for

the biggest influence (45 percent), followed by politicians (40 per-

cent), business and industrial leaders (37 percent), letters-to-the-

editor writers (33 percent) and the owners (31 percent). Obviously,

the respondents were allowed to check more than one choice.

In the second question the readers were asked, "Which of the

following, if any, do you think would be able to prevent an editorial

on a controversial subject frora being published in the newspaper?"

The governor of the state (36 percent), the mayor (25 percent) and

"don't know" (22 percent) all got a higher percentage of votes than

did the answer most editorialists would probably like to see — "not

anyone," which got 16 percent. Neither "owner" nor "publisher" was

13

listed as a choice.

The foregoing question, of course, concerned perceptions of an

impersonal entity: the editorial page. How do perceptions change as

readers are confronted with a name rather than an impersonal source of

information?

In a study by Sargent (1965), a comparison was made between the

way readers and viewers perceived "personal" as opposed to "impersonal"

sources of news information as presented by newspapers, television and

a news magazine. In that study, 296 undergraduate students at Ohio

University were asked to rate eight sources of information, four that

were impersonal (Time; TV special events show, NBC; a staff writer, New

York Tiraes; and U.S. News &_ World Report) and four identified individ-

ual authors (Huntley, Brinkley of NBC; David Lawrence of U.S. News &

World Report; James Reston of the New York Times; and Gene Rawling of

Time).

Compared with impersonal sources, the personal sources were per-

ceived by the subjects to be significantly more accurate, more sincere,

more responsible, more impartial and calmer. It is important to note

that four of the five attributes (accuracy, impartiality, sincerity and

responsibility) are, as Sargent calls them, "ethical factors," valued

in news sources and, one would imagine, valued at least as highly and

probably more highly in sources of opinion.

These findings seem consistent with those of Culbertson and Sora-

erick (1976) in their study of bylines and quotation marks in straight

news matter:

14

Interviewing 283 people in southeastern Ohio, Culbertson and Som-

erick found that 70 percent of the respondents said they usually or

sometimes noticed bylines. Of the total number of respondents, 78 per-

cent said they perceived that bylines meant, "The reporter is willing

to stand up and be counted — to take responsibility for what he has

written," and 67 percent perceived the byline to mean, "The reporter

raust be a capable person to get his name up there."

It should be noted that both the Sargent and the Culbertson and

Somerick studies dealt with supposedly "opinionless" news matter, not

persuasively oriented editorial comment.

Another, earlier study by Greenberg and Tannenbaum (1961) dealt

more closely with the relationships between bylines in persuasive mes-

sages and the credibility attributed to the author. The work of Green-

berg and Tannenbaum raost closely parallels the research being undertaken

in the present study.

In this study of University of Wisconsin undergraduate students,

three persuasive raessages were presented on different topics, each with

a different byline treatment selected from four possible treatments:

byline at the top of the message, byline in the raiddle, byline at the

bottom and no byline.

The study showed differences approaching significance (p=.06) if

some form of byline was used as opposed to instances in which no byline

was used. Some qualifying factors, of course, came into play.

First, according to the study, when the source is "positive,"

there is more need to introduce it near the beginning of the message.

15

Conversely, they hypothesize, a "negative" source will produce more

opinion change in the desired direction if placed at the end of the

message.

Further, Greenberg and Tannenbaum stress that placement of a by-

line in any of these positions does not guarantee that it will be no-

ticed at that point in the presentation. The operative factor, they

emphasize, is not where the byline is but when the reader perceives it.

In suramary, past research has shown differences in perceptions of

informational messages and those intended to persuade; that several

factors are involved in opinion change that relate to the source; that

more "trustworthy" and "expert" sources are more likely to be believed;

that when the source is only "raildly credible" a discrepant message

may "backfire," causing source credibility to drop instead of causing

the message to be accepted; that editorial writers' credibility may not

be as high as most would like to believe; and that the use of "bylines"

on opinion-oriented material will produce almost significantly more

opinion change in the desired direction than anonymous opinion matter.

This study is designed to bring together several points touched

upon in the quoted research in an attempt to determine which of the in-

teracting factors discussed in all of these studies is dorainant in re-

gard to source credibility applied to the newspaper editorialist.

CHAPTER III

METHOD AND PROCEDURE

The study of editorial credibility of signed and unsigned editor-

ials was conducted in two parts: a laboratory experiment and a tele-

phone survey.

The laboratory experiment:

The experiment was designed to test differences in credibility

scores given to editorials by subjects who read a signed editorial and

those who read an unsigned editorial. The experiment setting allowed

control of most of the intervening variables which would not have been

possible using survey techniques. These stricter controls were design-

ed to add the greatest internal validity possible.

The null hypothesis in the experiment was: There is no signifi-

cant difference in credibility scores between subjects who read the

signed editorial and those who read the unsigned.

The experiment was conducted in four parts during August and Sep-

tember of 1978. Four organizations — two Kiwanis clubs, one group of

PEX telephone operators and a local Jaycee-ettes chapter — took part

in the experiment during their regular monthly meetings.

The groups used represented only a part of the community since

educational level, income and socio-economic status of the subjects were

expected to be higher that those of a true cross section. More men are

16

17

represented in sample than women. All of these characteristics, how-

ever, seem to coincide with the readership of the average daily news-

paper. (Westley and Severin, 1964)

The subjects in each group were assigned to either the control or

experimental group by the order of seating, e.g. every other chair got

a signed editorial and adjacent chairs got unsigned ones.

The actual procedure for the experiment consisted of a pre-test

questionnaire (Appendix A), reading of the editorial (Appendix B) and

a post-test questionnaire (Appendix C).

Explanation of the experiment was kept to a minimum beforehand.

Subjects were told only that the study concerned various attitudes to-

ward editorial pages.

The Pre-test

The pre-test contained questions on demographics, media usage and

political leanings, plus four questions each on subjects' predisposi-

tions toward the local newspaper, the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal; and

attitudes concerning labor unions in general and police and firemen's

unions in particular. Responses were graded on a five-point Likert at-

titude scale.

The Editorial

The editorial used in the experiment was one that appeared in the

morning edition of the Avalanche-Journal, August 16, 1978, entitled

18

"Memphis—Public Be Damned." It concerned a police and firemen's strike

in Memphis, Tenn. After outlining the facts of the Memphis dispute—

the fact that the strike was in defiance of a court order, the fact that

National Guardsmen were called out to keep the peace, the salary offer

by the city—the editorialist came down firmly against the police and

firemen, saying they were lawbreakers and should be dealt with as such.

The editorial was generally in agreement with the newspaper's con-

servative political attitudes and, as has always been the policy at the

paper, it was unsigned when it originally appeared.

For the experiment, 30 photocopies of the editorial were reproduced

exactly as the editorial had appeared. Another 30 copies were repro-

duced identically, except for the appearance of a signature at the bottom

of the editorial. The signaturé was that of "Robert H. Mason."

It should be noted that the Avalanche-Journal has three editorial

writers on its staff. Two of the three, Editor Jay Harris and Associate

Editor Ken May, are fairly well known because of signed columns (Harris'

in the morning edition, May's in the evening). The other editorial

writer, Joe Hughes, has been on the Avalanche-Journal's news staff for

several years, but has no personal column and would probably be no better

known to the average reader than the fictitious "Robert H. Mason."

The editorial itself was chosen, after it had appeared, because it

was in keeping with the paper's general editorial outlook and that it

concerned an issue of interest to Lubbock readers, but also because it

would not bring out strong predispositions since the city had had no

real problems with public employee unions in the recent past.

19

By choosing a fictitious editorialist and an issue divorced from

the city, it was believed that prejudices in those areas would be les-

sened and their effects on the credibility issue dampened.

The Post-Test

The post-test first sought to determine understanding of the edi-

torial itself by giving three possible interpretations of the overall

emphasis of the editorial. One interpretation covered an issue not

addressed at all in the editorial; one covered a side issue that was

treated by the editorialist only in passing (though it contained some

of the editorial's rhetoric); and the third interpretation was the one

considered correct.

Respondents were also questioned about agreement with the editorial

and their perceptions of why editorials are not generally signed, then

were asked a series of questions designed to raeasure the editorial's

credibility.

"Credibility" was defined by four questions (nurabers 24, 25, 27

and 30 on the post-test):

24. Regardless of your opinion of this particular editorial, do you believe that comments such as these are a valid source of infor-mation on public issues?

25. Regardless of your agreement with the editorial, how much re-spect do you have for the opinions expressed? (choices: very much; quite a bit; some; not much; none at all)

27. What was your overall assessment of the editorial on the strike? (choices: very credible; credible; somewhat credible; not too credible; not at all credible)

30. Did reading the editorial on the Memphis strike change your opinion at all?

20

Two questions also attempted to determine if the 30 subjects who

got the signed editorials would notice the signature or could identify

the name "Robert H- Mason." Subjects were also asked whether or not

they had read the editorial before the experiment.

Analysis

The major analysis in the experiment was through a one-way analysis

of variance to determine whether credibility ratings of the editorials

(the dependent variable) were related to whether or not the editorial

was signed (the independent variable).

Aside from this analysis, subjects were asked whether a signature

at the bottom of an editorial would make it more believable, less be-

lievable or about the sarae in terms of believability.

The telephone survey

The telephone survey was designed to add external validity to the

study by providing a wider cross section of the coramunity.

The Survey Questionnaire

A 15-item survey questionnaire (Appendix D) was used to determine

general attitudes toward Avalanche-Journal editorials. The questions

were not keyed to one specific editorial as were the experiment ques-

21

tionnaires. Following questions on media usage, respondents were asked

about their agreement with Avalanche-Journal editorials and their as-

sessment of the believability of the editorials.

As had been done in the experiment, respondents were also asked

their interpretation of the raeaning of unsigned editorials, and respon-

ses were divided into four categories. Also carried over from the ex-

periment questionnaire was the question: If an editorial is signed by

an individual who wrote it, would it make you believe it raore, less or

about the same?

To determine whether signatures were noticed at all, respondents

were asked how often the Avalanche-Journal signs its editorials. To

avoid possible confusion, it was explained that the editorials were al-

ways carried in the upper left-hand portion of the editorial page and

were not accompanied by the writer's picture. As has been previously

noted, the Avalanche-Journal does not sign its editorials and never has.

The questionnaire also contained items on demographics including

age, sex, income and occupation.

The Sample

A pre-test of 20 randomly selected respondents was used to deter-

mine sample size. The "believability" variable (What is your overall

assessment of Avalanche-Journal editorials?) was used to deterraine stan-

dard deviation.

The pre-test resulted in a standard deviation of 9.834. Confidence

22

interval was set at 95 percent and tolerated error was set at + .6 on

a five-point scale.

For the preceding parameters, calculations dictated a sample size

of 201.

Respondents for the survey were picked from residential listings

of the Lubbock telephone directory. Names were picked randomly, using

the final digit in a table of random numbers to choose the first page,

then using another final digit to determine the column, then the final

two digits in another random nuraber for the name within the column.

Following that selection, every 234th name was used unless that

listing was for a business firm, in which case surveyers were instruct-

ed to go to the next residential listing. In cases in which respondents

were unwilling to cooperate, the next residential listing was used.

Three questions w ere asked open-endedly:

3. What is your favorite section of the newspaper?

4. Aside from newspapers and TV, where do you get your news?

9. When a name is not signed at the bottom of an editorial, what does it raean to you?

Responses to the three questions were then catagorized into four

choices (for responses, see Appendix D). The reraaining questions were

asked with the choices provided by the interviewer.

Volunteer mass communications students who assisted in the survey

work were given specific instructions on how to conduct the interviews

and were provided with written guidelines (Appendix E).

All surveys were corapleted during October 1978.

23

Analysis

Several correlations were used in analyzing results. Primary

analysis was through correlation of the believability variable (ques-

tion 7, Appendix D) with the variable designed to determine understand-

ing of the purpose for unsigned editorials (question 9). This analysis

was designed to determine whether or not those readers who understand

unsigned editorials are more likely to be influenced by them.

To better interpret the results of that correlation, a correlation

was computed between agreement with editorials (question 6) and believ-

ability. On the basis of research cited earlier (Aronson, Turner and

Carlsmith, 1963), it would be expected that this correlation would be

fairly strong, since an agreeable message is much more easily believed,

regardless of source credibility.

Also used in analysis was the correlation between believability

and correctness of response to the question: If you can remember, how

often would you say the Avalanche-Journal signs its editorials? This

analysis was designed to answer the question: If a reader notices the

lack of signature, will he be more or less likely to believe the content

of the editorial?

In addition to these analyses, descriptive data from question 10

(If an editorial is signed by an individual who wrote it, would it make

you believe it more or less or about the same?) should give insight into

readers' conscious desires on the use of editorial signatures.

CHAPTER IV

RESULTS

Laboratory Experiraent Results:

Deraographics

As had been expected, the demographics of the groups used did not

coincide with the general population. Median age of the subjects was

38.5; median yearly income was between $21,000 and $30,000; by far the

largest percentage (71.2 percent) of subjects were "business or profes-

sional" by occupation; only 1.7 percent of the subjects had not finished

high school and 23.3 percent had finished advanced college degrees; and

more men (37) were represented than woraen (23).

Media Usage

In terras of raedia usage, raedian television watching per day araong

subjects was 2.1 hours. Newspaper reading was relatively high, with

83.3 percent of the subjects saying they read either the raorning or

afternoon Avalanche-Journal. Another 8.3 percent said they read both

editions and 8.3 percent said they read neither on a regular basis. In

television news, local news seemed more popular than network news, with

84.3 percent saying they watched local news at least a few days a week

while 76.6 percent said they watched national television news at least

a few days a week. In overall news (not restricted to television or news-

24

25

papers) interest, 52.6 percent said they favored national news while

47.4 percent favored local news. Asked to list their favorite section

of the newspaper, subjects picked the front page (48.3 percent), sports

section (21.7 percent) and "feature stories" (18.3 percent) as the three

most popular. Editorials and columns were favored by only 8.3 percent.

Political leanings

In rating their own political leanings, 6.7 percent said they were

"very conservative," 51.7 percent said they were "conservative," 38.3

percent considered themselves "moderate," 3.3 percent thought they were

"liberal" and none of the subjects would admit to being "very liberal."

Attitude Scales

Using the five-point Likert scale questions as a measure, attitudes

of the subjects toward the Avalanche-Journal were close to neutral (with

5 being considered very positive and 1 being very negative, overall com-

puted attitude was 2.941). Attitudes toward unions were generally nega-

tive (on the same scale, overall computed attitude was 2.462).

Analysis of Variance

Main analysis of the experiment was by raeans of analysis of vari-

ance of responses to four "credibility" questions, with editorial ident-

26

ification (signed or unsigned) as the independent variable. Mean scores

credibility variables are shown in Table I.

As can be seen in Table II, the difference in credibility scores

among readers of signed editorials is not significantly different from

those of subjects who read unsigned ones.

On the basis of this analysis, the null hypothesis — that there is

no significant difference in credibility scores between subjects who read

the signed editorial and those who read the unsigned — cannot be re-

jected.

This result is reinforced by the results of two questions. When

subjects were asked, "Did you notice anything unusual about the editor-

ial on the Memphis strike?" only four (13.8 percent) of the 30 subjects

who read the signed editorial picked the signature as the unusual ele-

ment. When asked, "Who is Robert H. Mason?" (the fictitious writer

whose signature appeared on the editorial), only five subjects (17.2

percent) who read the signed editorial correctly identified Robert H.

Mason as the signer.

Descriptive Statistics

In addition, other descriptive statistics seem to further reinforce

the null hypothesis. For instance, when asked if they would believe a

signed editorial more, less or about the same as an unsigned one, 27.6

percent of the subjects said they would believe it raore, 69 percent said

they would believe it about the same, and only 3.4 percent said they

TABLE I

Credibility Mean Scores

Regardless of your opinion of this particular editorial, do you believe that coraments such as these are a valid source of information on public issue?

Yes=2, No=l

Mean score=1.732

Regardless of your agreeraent with the editorial, how much respect do you have for the opinions expressed?

none at all=l not rauch=2 sorae=3 quite a bit=4 very rauch=5

Mean score=3.475

What was your overall assess-raent of the editorial on the strike?

not at all credible=l not too credible=2 somewhat credible=3 credible=4 very credible=5

Mean score=3.448

Did reading the editorial on the Memphis strike change your opinion at all?

yes=2, no=l

Mean score=1.102

COMPUTED CREDIBILITY SCORE Least possible=4 Highest possible=14

Mean score=9.745

27

TABLE II

Analysis of Variance

Credibility by Signature

Source Sura of Squares DF Mean Square F Significance

Main effects of signature

0.028 0.028 0.006 .939

Residual 250.408 53 4.725

Total 250.436 54 4.638

28

29

would believe it less. This finding may suggest that the lack of sig-

nificant difference in the ANOVA steras not from a balancing between

individuals who are negatively affected by the signature and those pos-

itively affected, but may instead reflect a true lack of difference

between the two practices.

The analytical results are further amplified by the results of the

question:

31. Newspaper editorials are usually not signed by the in-dividual who wrote them. Which of the following statements best expresses what you think about why editorials are not signed? Check one:

Individual editors don't want to "take the heat" for ex-pressing their opinions publicly on issues they may not un-derstand fully.

The editorial expresses the view of the entire newspaper. not just that of the individual who wrote it.

The owner or publisher of a newspaper, though he doesn't write the editorial, dictates what is written, so the writer shouldn't take credit for someone else's opinion.

It really doesn't mean anything to me whether editorials

are signed or not.

Most editors questioned, including those at the Avalanche-Journal

justify unsigned editorials with the second response or one similar to

it. It is doubtful that any would choose the first. The subjects test-

ed showed less understanding for the practice, however. Though a large

percentage (35.1 percent) chose the "right" alternative — that editor-

ials express the entire newspaper's opinion — 17.5 percent said editor-

30

ials reflected the publisher's wishes, 10.5 percent said the editors

were unwilling to "take the heat," and 36.8 percent said it did not raatter

to them one way or the other. This large number of "don't cares" again

agrees with the ANOVA result indicating no significant difference in

effect between signed and unsigned editorials.

One other interesting and possibly significant finding concerns

the question used to determine whether subjects grasped the meaning of

the editorial. The question and possible answers were stated:

In your opinion, which of the following statements best suras up the thrust of the editorial on the Memphis strike.

The pay raise offered by the city to the union raembers was reasonable and should have been accepted.

The police and firemen who walked off the job in an ille-gal strike shirked their responsibility and should have been dealt with as lawbreakers.

City administrations are powerless to deal with such strikes since "no strike laws" do not work when union mob psychology takes over.

As stated earlier, the second choice came closest to expressing

the overall thrust of the editorial. The third choice was a side issue

addressed in passing, and the first choice was not really addressed.

Subjects showed a good grasp of the editorial's raeaning, with 79.7 per-

cent choosing the correct response, 15.3 percent choosing the side is-

sue, and only 5.1 percent choosing the issue not addressed. Based on

this finding, it would seem that the lack of difference in credibility

scores could not be attributed to lack of understanding of the editorial,

31

In suramary, this experiment indicates that among the subjects test-

ed, who represent a higher than average level on socio-economic and

educational scales, there is no significant difference in credibility

between signed and unsigned editorials. There is some evidence also

that this lack of difference is attributable to a large segment of read-

ers who either do not notice or do not care whether editorials are sign-

ed by the author or not.

Telephone Survey Results:

Demographics

Demographically, respondents in the telephone survey were closer

to a cross section of the city of Lubbock than were the subjects of the

laboratory experiment. The median age of the 201 respondents was 34.5;

the median income was between $10,000 and $20,000; the median education-

al level was 13.75 years. Occupationally, 38.5 percent were "business

or professional," 20.3 percent were "skilled labor," 17,7 percent were

"clerical," 17.7 percent were "housewives," and 5.5 percent were "unskil-

led labor." Of the 201 respondents, 102 were women and 99 were men.

Media Usage

In media usage the sample also seemed closer to national averages.

Median television watching time per day was 2.98 hours. One hundred

and forty-nine respondents said they subscribed to the Avalanche-Journal

32

and 52 did not subscribe. Unlike the experiment subjects, more survey

respondents chose sports as their favorite part of the newspaper (30.3

percent); followed by the front page (chosen by 26.9 percent); "others"

(18.4 percent); features (7.8 percent); and entertainment (7.3 percent).

Editorials and columns were chosen as the favorite section by only 5.7

percent of the respondents.

Analysis

As earlier stated, main analysis was by means of correlation be-

tween the believability variable (question 7, Appendix D) and understand-

ing of why editorials are not signed (question 9). After initial exam-

ination, responses as to why editorials are not signed were separated

into two categories: the "correct" response — that editorials repre-

sent a consensus — in one group; and the "incorrect" and "don't care"

responses in another. (See Table III) From this point, Chi square

analysis showed no significant difference (Chi square=1.0873, df=4,

significance=.5005) in believability between subjects who understood

the meaning of signed editorials and those who did not know or did not

care. Again, as in the experiment, the null hypothesis could not be

rejected.

Another assumption made earlier on the basis of prior research —

that agreement with editorial opinion is correlated to believability —

was upheld by this study, as is reflected in Table IV.

TABLE III

Crosstabulation of Believability by Understanding of Signature

Believability

Correct response

incorrect or "don't care"

Column totals

X2=1.0873

1

2 1.12%

8 4.5%

10 5.62%

2

2 1.12%

10 5.62%

12 6.74%

deg

3

14 7.87%

54 30.34%

68 38.2%

rees of fr

4

11 6.18%

60 33.71%

71 39.89%

eedom=4

5

2 1.12%

15 8.43%

17 9.55%

Sig-

Row Totals

31 17.41%

147 82.59%

178 100%

nificance=.5005

33

34

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35

In addition to these findings, several other reader characteristics

showed significant correlation to believability, as shown in Table IV.

Regular subscribers were apt to believe editorials to a greater degree

(Correlation coefficient=.2685, Significance=.001); those who read the

editorials more often are more likely to find them believable (Correla-

tion coefficient=.2260, Significance=.001); and age is slightly correla-

ted in that older individuals tend to believe editorials more (Correla-

tion coefficient=.1545, Significance=.019).

Descriptive Statistics

Descriptive data on pertinent questions of the survey also proved

revealing. When asked how often they read editorials, 11.9 percent of

the respondents said never, 32.8 percent said seldom, 26.9 percent said

a few days a week and 28.4 percent said every day.

Asked how often they agreed with Avalanche-Journal editorials, 9.3

percent of those surveyed said never, 20.8 percent said seldom, 37.7 per-

cent said sometimes, 24.6 percent said usually and 7.7 percent said al-

ways.

In assessing Avalanche-Journal editorials overall in terms of be-

lievability, 5.5 percent found them not at all believable, 6.6 percent

found them not very believable, 38.5 percent found them soraewhat believ-

able, 39.6 percent said they were believable and 9.9 percent said they

were very believable.

There seemed to be a lot of confusion on how often the A-J signs

its editorials. It will be remembered that the correct answer is

36

"never." Despite this long standing practice, 14.5 percent of the re-

spondents thought the editorials were always signed, 20.5 percent thought

they were usually signed, 13 percent thought they were signed soraetimes,

13 percent thought they were seldom signed, 11 percent said they were

never signed and 28 percent said they couldn't remember.

On the question of why editorials are not signed, respondents ex-

hibited confusion and indifference. The largest percentage, 36.5 per-

cent, said the lack of signature raeant the editor was afraid to take a

public stand on the issue by signing his narae. Another 33.3 percent

said the lack of signature raeant nothing at all to them; 16.7 percent

thought an unsigned editorial represented a consensus; and 13.5 percent

said unsigned editorials represented the owner or publisher's viewpoint.

Asked if they would believe a signed editorial more than an un-

signed one, 42.8 percent said they would believe it more, 53.1 percent

said they would believe it about the same amount, and 4.1 percent said

they would believe it less.

In summary, the telephone survey further reinforced the hypothesis

that there is no significant difference in believability between signed

and unsigned editorials by showing that notice or understanding of sig-

natures, or the lack of them, does not affect believability.

CHAPTER V

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

Summary

The overall question to be answered in this study was, do news-

paper readers notice or care about signatures on editorial comments

and if so, does that notice significantly increase or decrease the cred-

ibility of the editorial?

Two methods were used to study the question. A laboratory experi-

ment using four Lubbock, Texas, civic groups tested credibility scores

between a group of 30 individuals who were given an unsigned editorial,

representing the paper's standard practice, and 30 others who were asked

to read the same editorial with a fictitious signature at the bottom. m

A pre-test was used to deterraine pre-existing attitudes both toward the

newspaper and the subject of the editorial: public employees' unions

and strikes. After reading the editorial, subjects were asked a series

of questions including four testing the credibility of the message pre-

sented. These "credibility scores" were then compared between the groups

of readers of signed and unsigned editorials by raeans of an analysis of

variance. Results of that comparison did not approach significance.

Analysis of other questions in the experiment indicated that the lack of

significant difference could not be attributed to lack of understanding

of the message and that while a substantial portion of the subjects

37

38

seemed to understand the lack of signature, an even bigger proportion

did not care whether the editorial was signed or not.

In the other portion of the study, 201 individuals were chosen at

random from the Lubbock telephone directory and questioned on their

general impressions of the Avalanche-Journal and its editorials. One

question specifically asked respondents to rate the newspaper's editor-

ials in terms of believability. Another question asked the respondents'

opinions on why newspaper editorials are not signed. When results of

the believability question were correlated to "correct" assumptions

about why editorials are not signed, the results did not approach sig-

nificance. Several other correlations, however, were significant.

Credibility was significantly and positively related to agreement with

editorial opinion, frequency of readership of editorials, and age.

Of the 201 respondents, 74.1 percent said they subscribed to the

Avalanche-Journal; 55.3 percent said they read the A-J's editorials at

least a few days a week; the largest percentage (37.7 percent) said they

agreed with A-J editorials "sometimes"; 78.1 percent rated A-J editorials

either "somewhat believable" or "believable."

Limitations of the study:

The most obvious limitation of the laboratory experiment, as stated

earlier, is that the subjects do not represent a true cross section of

the Lubbock coramunity. Their mere participation in civic and social

organizations sets them apart to a certain extent from the community

39

norms simply because they are more active. They were also found to be

above average in terms of education and income. As a result, they

would be expected to be more enlightened on the question of why editor-

ials are not signed. This sophistication is shown in the differences

between responses in the experiment and the telephone survey on the

question of why editorials are not signed. Thirty-five and one-tenth

percent of the experimental subjects picked the "correct" answer to this

question while 16.7 percent of survey respondents chose the "correct"

answer. It is interesting to note that about the same percentage in

both groups (36.8 percent in the experiment and 31.8 percent in the sur-

vey) said the lack of signature meant nothing at all to them.

Another obvious limitation of the experiment was the use of a fic-

titious name for the editorial writer. It was felt in the design of the

experiment that the use of a known name would produce raore or less cred-

ibility based raore on the individual involved and not the mere presence

or absence of a signature. On the basis of prior research, however,

(particularly that of Greenberg & Tannenbaum, 1961) an editorialist who

has high credibility among his readers would produce more credibility

than an unknown writer, whether that writer were identified or not.

In the experiment and the survey, readers questioned were from one

West Texas city and were readers of one newspaper. Though no assump-

tions were made as to the sophistication of the readers or concerning

the newspaper and its editorials, some caution should be taken in attemp-

ting to generalize the results to apply to other newspapers in other

regions.

40

Conclusions

From all that has been written here it might be assumed that cred-

ibility, no matter how it is achieved, is the ultimate good; that should

this study have proven signed editorials to be significantly more cred-

ible than unsigned ones, then editors automatically should have begun

signing editorials. That is not at all what was intended.

Whether or not to sign editorials has always been, at least to the

editors questioned on the subject, more of an ethical matter than simply

one of how best to persuade. It is expected that editors will continue

to make the decision whether or not to sign editorials on that basis.

This study is intended only as a guide for those editors who have

made such an ethical choice and want to know what to expect in terms of

effect on credibility.

Those ethical arguments are clearly stated in the Summer, 1967,

issue of Masthead. Ralph Coghlan, former editorial page editor of the

St Louis Post-Dispatch, argued that television news had brought about

the need for a return to the "personal journalism" of an earlier era

and that signed editorials should be part of that change.

"The editorial 'we' has long become a joke even among ourselves. It is a cover-up of identity. In my many years of editorial writing, I often found myself charged with cowardice by readers who could not seem to understand why the writer of sharp opinions did not print them under his own name." (p. 45)

Coghlan also felt that signing editorials would ease the public's

impatience with the "stuffed-shirtism" they often perceive in newspapers;

41

that signatures would create raore readership by placing them on a more

favorable footing with signed columns; that it would improve the quality

of writing; and that more competent writers should have the recognition

that signatures would provide.

In replying to Coghlan's arguments, Robert U. Brown, editor and

publisher of Editor & Publisher Magazine, said that editorial writing

was a team job and that the signature of one individual would be mis-

leading on a consensus opinion or an opinion dictated by the publisher.

"There are many times when an editorial reflects the views of an editorial writer which have been accepted in conference, or tacitly, by the owner-publisher-editor com-bination. There are just as many times when an editorial writer writes a piece to reflect the opinions of that dom-inating combination. There are also many times — and many newspapers on which this happens — where an editor-ial is not the product of one raan's thinking (even the owner's) but an amalgam of thought pounded out in an edi-torial conference of several people. What purpose would it serve to put on the editorial the name of the techni-cian (a skilled editorial writer, albeit) who was assign-ed to express in words the agreed-upon thought or policy." (P^ 46)

For the editor who, on the basis of these and other such consider-

ations, decides to begin running signed editorials, this study indicates

that such a practice, while it may not enhance credibility, will not

detract from it either.

Recommendations for Future Research

In reviewing the literature for this study, the most striking point

was that there has been so little applied to research in the field of

42

editorial credibility. Though some researchers (particularly Stonecipher,

1967, 1968) have speculated that certain principles discovered in com-

munication research might be applied to the work of the editorial writer,

very few of them have been tested in this rather peculiar mode of coramun-

ication.

Though there is great need for research in regard to the editorial

message itself and the audiences of those messages, the following sug-

gestions concern the part of communication dealt with in the present

study, source credibility.

1. As stated earlier, this study used a fictitious source for the

editorial experiment. The same type of study using a readily indenti-

fiable source would probably produce more marked differences in readers

of signed and unsigned editorials. A pretest could determine the degree

of source credibility of the individual who is to sign the message.

2. Along the same lines, a three-cell experiment, using a "high

credibility," a "low credibility," and an unnamed source (as could be

determined by pre-testing) would enhance the findings of this study.

3. Though the Greenberg and Tannenbaum (1961) study shed sorae

light in the area of placeraent of signature, raore research is needed to

determine if type size and face variation would raake editorial signatures

more noticeable.

4. Mere replication of the methods used in this study with dif-

ferent readers in different parts of the nation would provide insight,

especially in areas where newspapers have begun to experiment with sign-

ed editorials.

43

5. A certain number of assumptions had to be made in this study

as to why editors do not sign editorials. These assumptions were made

after conversations with several editors, including those of the news-

paper used in the study, the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal. Though it was

beyond the scope of this study, a nationwide poll of editors concern-

ing their attitudes toward signed editorials would be raost helpful, not

only in further research of this type, but to editors who are deciding

whether or not to sign their own editorials.

REFERENCES

American Newspaper Association. News Research for Better Newspapers, New York, Vol. 6, 78-79.

The American College Dictíonary, New York: Random House, 1968.

Aronson, E. Turner, J, A. & Carlsmith, J. M. Communicator credibility and communication descrepancy as determinants of opinion change. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 1963, 67 (1), 31-36.

Brown, R.U. Editorial writing: a team job. Masthead, 1967, 19(1), 46-47.

Coghlan, R. Strip away the veil of anonymity. Masthead, 1967, 19(1), 43-46.

Culbertson, H.M. & Somerick, N. Quotation marks and bylines — what do they mean to readers? Journalism Quarterly, 1976, 53, 463-467; 508.

Festinger, L. A Theory of Cognítive Dissonance, Evanston, 111.: Row, Peterson, 1957.

Greenberg, B.S. & Tannenbaum, P.H. The effects of bylines on attitude change. Journalism Quarterly, 1961, 38, 535-537.

Greenberg, B.S. & Roloff, M.E. Mass media credibility: research results and critical issues. ANPA Research Bulletin, 1974, 105-148.

Hohenberg, J. The Professional Journalist. New York: Holt Rinehart & Winston, 1978.

Hovland, C.I. & Weiss, W. The influence of source credibility on commun-ication effects. Public Opinion Quarterly, 1951, 15, 635-650.

Hulteng, J.L. Public conceptions of influences on editorial page views. Journalísm Quarterly, 1969, 46, 362-364.

Kelman, H.C. Processes of opinion change. The Processes and Effects of M^ss Communication, ed. by Schramm, W. & Roberts, D.F., Urbana, Xii.: University of Illinois Press, 1974, 399-425.

Monk M.S. The credibility of signed vs. unsigned editorials in student publications. Unpublished manuscript, Texas Tech University, 1977.

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45

National Scholastic Press Association/Associated Collegiate Press. Newspaper Guidebook, Minneapolis, Minn.: NSPA/ACP, 1976, 19.

Rhodin, E. Newspapermen, An Introduction to Journalism, New York: Odyssey Press, 1967.

Schraram, W. The nature of communication between humans. The Processes and Effects of Mass Comraunication, ed. by Schraram, W. & Roberts, D. F., Urbana, 111.: University of Illinois Press, 1974, 2-53.

Stonecipher, H.W. Thoughts on editorial credibility. Masthead, 1967, 27(1), 43-48.

Stonecipher, H.W. Thoughts on reader persuasibility, Masthead, 1968, 28(1), 36-40.

Sargent, L.W. Communicator image and news reception. Journalisra Quarterly, 1965, 42, 35-42.

Westley, B.H. & Severin, W.J. Some correlates of media credibility. Journalism Quarterly, 1964, 41, 325-327.

APPENDIXES

APPENDIX A: EXPERIMENT PRE-TEST

1. Age

2. Sex

3. Occupation

4. Education: some high school finished high school some college finished college check one some graduate work finished advanced degree

5. Combined family income: check one less than $10,000/year $10,000 to $20,000 ' $20,000 to $30,000 more than $30,000

6. If you had to classify yourself in terms of political beliefs, would you say you are:

very conservative ; conservative ; moderate ; liberal

very liberal .

7. On average, how many hours a day do you watch TV? hours

8. About how many days a week do you watch the national TV news?

everyday ; almost everyday ; a few days a week ; hardly

ever .

9. About how many days a week do you watch the local TV news?

everyday ; almost everyday ; a few days a week ; hardly ever .

10. Do you read: the morning edition of The Avalanche-Journal; the evening edition of The Avalanche-Journal; both; neither.

11 . Are you most i n t e r e s t e d in ^national news; c i t y news

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APPENDIX A (continued)

12. Which of the following is your favorite section of the newspaper?

the front page; feature stories; sports: ^entertain-iient; ^editorials and columns.

13. Aside from the newspaper and television, where do you get your news ?

For each of the following statements, would you say you: strongly agree; agree; have no opinion; disagree; or strongly disagree?

14. Overall, the Avalanche-Journal would compare favorably to other newspapers of comparable size.

strongly agree; agree; no opinion; ^disagree; strongly disagree.

15. Though I may not always agree with the editorial opinion in the Avalanche-Journal, the editorials seem to be well thought out and reasonable.

strongly agree; agree; no opinion; disagree; ^strongly disagree.

16. Sometimes I think the opinions of the Avalanche-Journal editors stray into the news columns more than in most newspapers.

strongly agree; agree; no opinion; ^disagree; strongly disagree.

17. The Avalanche-Journal seems to lean too often toward covering national news, often overlooking significant local stories.

strongly agree; agree; no opinion; ^disagree; strongly disagree.

18. There is no question that without labor unions, today's workers would be exploited, just as they were at the turn of the century,

strongly agree; agree; no opinion; ^disagree; strongly disagree.

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APPENDIX A (continued)

19. Though unions may have been needed at one time in this country, they are now a very real threat to any kind of economic recovery,

strongly agree; agree; no opinion; ^disagree; strongly disagree.

20. Even if one believes in unions for raost industries, there is no place for strikes in public service areas such as fire and police departments.

strongly agree; agree; no opinion; disagree; strongly disagree.

21. In the recent fire and police strike in Memphis, Tenn., the city, because of its uncomproraising attitude, was as much to blame for the strike as was the union involved.

strongly agree; agree; no opinion; disagree; strongly disagree.

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APPENDIX B: THE EDITORIAL

Page 4. Section A Lubbock, Texas, Wednesday Morning, August 16, 1978

.^^' EDITORIAL:

Memphis—Public Be Damned MEMPHIS POLICE and firefighters be-

trayed a Oistressing loss of their sense of personal responsibility by participating in il-legal strikes in defiance of court orders to return to work

This is what happens when public em-ployes are given the privilege of coîlective bargaining. State and federal governments can pass all the "lio-strike' laws they want, but union mob psyf*hology will make such laws next to worthlesí:..

When poUcemen. fircmen and others who have the responsibiUty of protecting lives, property and health put vheir own wage de-mands ahead of the public safety and wel-fare, it is time to replace them.

TENNESSEE National Guardsmen were called out when the policemer walked off the job the other day. just as théy had been when Memphis firemen staged a three-day strike in early July. v

P'iromen again voted to strike. aloriig with tho policomen, this week.

In each instance, the Guardsmen found themselves not only trying to do the strikers' jobs for them but on occasion even having to deal with the strikers as the lawbreakers they are.

Memphis Mayor Wyeth Chandler issued

what he calied an ultimatum over the week-end for the poUcemen to return to work or face suspension, but the picture that came through was of a city administration weak and powerless to deal with the wildcat stri-kers.

Last Thursday. the union members had re-jected a city offer to raise the pay of a veter-an patrolman by $104. to $1,244 a month. im-mediately with a promise of two more raises in the next 15 months.

WHEN A PERSON takes a job. he knows what the pay. benefits and working condi-tions are. If it is a job that is vital to the public health and safety. he shirks his re-sponsibility if he walks off in concert with fellow employes and leaves the public vul-nerable and unprotected.

In San Antonio recently. city officials earned the respect and admiration of the na-tion by summarily firing sanitation workers who defiantly violated state law by going out on strike.

That is thc only way to deal with lawbrcak-ers. Policcmon. who ought to know bctter than anybody that coddling law violators on-ly leads to more lawbreaking, are setting a bad example for dissidents of all kinds when they behave in an iUegal manner as have those in Memphis. —Robert H. Mason

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APPENDIX C: EXPERIMENT POST-TEST

THE FOLLOWING QUESTIONS REFER TO THE PAGE YOU JUST READ, PARTICULARLY TO THE EDITORIAL ON THE MEMPHIS POLICE AND FIREMEN'S STRIKE.

22. In your opinion, which of the following statements best sums up the thrust of the editorial on the Memphis strike.

'^^^ Pay raise offered by the city to the union members was reasonable and should have been accepted.

.Tlie police and firemen who walked off the job in an illegal strike shirked their responsibility and should have been dealt with as lawbreakers.

City administrations are powerless to deal with such strikes since "no strike laws" do not work when union mob psychology takes over.

23. Do the opinions expressed in the editorial agree with what you believed prior to reading the editorial?

yes; no; I had no real opinion beforehand.

24. Regardless of your opinion of this particular editorial, do you believe that comments such as these are a valid source of infor-mation on public issues?

yes; no,

25. Regardless of your agreement with the editorial, how much respect do you have for the opinions expressed?

yery much; quite a bit; some; not much; none at all.

26. Did you notice anything unusual about the editorial on the Memphis strike? If so, what was it?

27. What was your overall assessment of the editorial on the strike?

very credible; credible; somewhat credible; not too credible; not at all credible,

28. Who is Robert H. Mason?

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APPENDIX C (continued)

29. If an editorial is signed at the bottom by the person who wrote it, would you tend to believe it: more; less; about the same as if it were not signed?

30. Did reading the editorial on the Memphis strike change your opin-ion at all? yes; no.

31. Newspaper editorials are usually not signed by the individual who wrote them. Which of the following statements best expresses what you think about why editorials are not signed? Check one.

Individual editors don't want to "take the heat" for express-ing their opinions publicly on issues they may not understand fully,

The editorial expresses the view of the entire newspaper, not just that of the individual who wrote it.

The owner or publisher of a newspaper, though he doesn't write the editorial, dictates what is written, so the writer should-n't take credit for soraeone else's opinion.

It really doesn't mean anything to me whether editorials are signed or not.

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9

APPENDIX D: TELEPHONE SURVEY QUESTIONNAIRE

_1. On the average, how many hours a day do you watch television

_2. Do you subscribe to the Avalanche-Journal? No=l ; Yes=2

_3. What is your favorite section of the newspaper? l=front page 2=feature stories 3=sports 4=entertainment 5=editorials & columns 6=others

_4. Aside from newspapers and TV, where do you get your news? l=radio 2=magazines 3=word of mouth 4=others

_5. How often do you read newspaper editorials? These are the columns in the upper left-hand portion of the editorial page. l=never 2=seldom 3=few days a week 4=everyday

_6. Do the Avalanche-Journal's editorials generally agree with your opinion? l=never 2=seldom 3=sometimes 4=usually 5=always

7. What is your overall assessment of Avalanche-Journal editorials? l=not at all believable 2=not very believable 3=somewhat believable 4=believable 5=very believable

8. If you can remember, how often would you say the Avalanche-Journal signs its editorials? l=always 2=usually 3=sometimes 4=hardly ever 5=never

53

APPENDIX D (continued)

_9. When a name is not signed at the bottom of an editorial, what does it mean to you? l=editor's afraid to take stand 2=means nothing at all 3=expresses the view of the publisher or owner 4=expresses the view of the entire newspaper

.10. If an editorial is signed by an individual who wrote it, would it make you believe it more or less or about the same? l=less 2=the same 3=more

.11. Sex: l=male 2=female

12. Occupation: l=unskilled labor 2=skilled labor 3=clerical 4=business or professional 5=housewife

_13. Approximate yearly income: l=less than $10,000 2=$10,000 to $20,000 3=$21,000 to $30,000 4=$30,000 or more

14 and 15. Number of years of education

16 and 17. Age in years

54

APPENDIX E: SURVEY INSTRUCTIONS

INSTRUCTIONS FOR TELEPHONE SURVEY:

Call the person listed on the slip of paper with this form, then call

every 234th name thereafter until you have the ten forms completed.

If the person at that nuraber will not cooperate, simply call the

number directly below that name. If the 234th name is a business or

agency, go to the next private listing after that. For easier narae

finding, there are ten names to the inch in the phone directory, so

simply measure 23 ^ column inches to get every 234th name,

In asking the questions, do not read the choices for questions

three, four, and nine. Simply ask the question, then classify the

answer into the appropriate category. Mark the responses on the lines

to the left of the questions.

When the person answers the phone, use the following introduction:

Hello, I am • I am a mass communications

student at Texas Tech. I am calling people at random to ask a few

questions about newspaper editorial believability. I promise, I'm not

selling anything and this will only take a few moraents.

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