Galtung and Ruge ~ NEWS VALUES

A2 Media Studies

What are NEWS VALUES?

News values, sometimes called news criteria, determine how much prominence a news story is given by a media outlet, and the attention it is given by the audience.

A. Boyd states that: "News journalism has a broadly agreed set of values, often referred to as 'newsworthines'..."[1] News values are not universal and can vary widely between different cultures.

In Western practice, decisions on the selection and prioritisation of news are made by editors on the basis of their experience and intuition.

However, analysis by J. Galtung and M. Ruge (1965) [2] showed that several factors are consistently applied across a range of news organizations

1. Boyd, A. (1994) Broadcast Journalism,Techniques of Radio and TV News. Oxford: Focal.

2. Galtung, J. & Ruge, M. Holmboe (1965): The Structure of Foreign News

Threshold when news becomes interesting enough to print, (according to the editor’s assessment)

Visual Imperative strong pictures make stories. Eg. the story of a ferry capsizing in Venezuala would not normally make front page news in the UK. However, if there were dramatic photographs then might well.

Proximity the closer to home it is, the more likely it is to be reported / printed, especially in the tabloid press (and of course, local press)

Continuity coverage of events over a period of time, continually re-angling of the story to present it as “new” (eg. Princess Diana’s driver has still not regained consciousness). More revelations to keep the public interested.

Frequency stories usually only last for one day, unless new angles give continuity Negativity take normal for granted. Deviant is newsworthy – crime, disaster, famine Predictability media fulfil their own expectations – stories in January about how the

country is brought to a halt by snow. Reporting of football hooligans when major English clubs play abroad. (Expect fighting and therefore report any incidents)

Unexpectedness presenting news as unexpected, even if it really is. Eg. at Christmas reporting on homelessness, which is actually going on all year round; when Sir Bob

Geldof releases Band Aid single again, focus on starving in Africa etc. Unambiguity news needs to be clear and simple. Highly complex situations are

presented as simple Composition balance achieved between home stories, foreign stories, political, human

interest etc. So if a newspaper has a large political front-page story it may well balance it out with a human-interest story even if it is fairly trivial.

Personalisation stories presented through the experiences of individuals. Eg. National Health Service waiting lists focusing on Baby X waiting for heart transplant or 80-year old Mary Smith waiting for a hip replacement.

Narrativisation items are called “stories” from the start and shaped into narrative form as soon as possible. Eg. Royals are presented as long-running saga, with shifting

characters of heroes and villains. Eg 2. During war, stories of women waiting at home whilst their men fight.

Threshold

The bigger impact the story has, the more people it affects, the more extreme the effect or the more money or resources it involves, the better its chances of hitting the news stands.

Look at the newspapers in front of you: What stories did each newspaper believe were

the most important ones yesterday? Dependent on newspaper – local vs. national… Editors are “gatekeepers”

Visual Imperative

A strong visual can push a story over the threshold Baby found in alive in a Brazilian lake might make a

couple of lines in a UK newspaper A visual of this gave the story headline status http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4659568.stm http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10693294/ns/world_news-

americas/t/brazilians-line-adopt-baby-found-bag/#.Tv3relYgRWk

Identify any stories in your newspaper which you believe crossed the threshold due to visual imperatives…

Proximity

the closer to home it is, the more likely it is to be reported / printed, especially in the tabloid press (and of course, local press)

Look at the local papers in front of you: How many stories were from out of the

geographical area? What made these stories cross the threshold?

In national paper, how many front-page stories were international?

Continuity

coverage of events over a period of time, continually re-angling of the story to present it as “new” (eg. The Duke of Edinburgh will leave hospital today…) More revelations to keep the public interested.

A story which is already in the news gathers a kind of momentum – the running story.

This is partly because news teams are already in place to report the story, and partly because previous reportage may have made the story more accessible to the public.

The Royal Wedding / Prince Philip’s recent illness… What stories in your newspaper are “running stories”?

Frequency

Newspapers work to a tight time schedule Events are more readily reported which happen “conveniently” to

their schedules Last press-run used to be around midnight, now with NMT / regional

printing, can hold the front page until around 6 am for final edition) Often these are events which occur suddenly Events which are of short duration and require little explanation,

such as motorway pile-ups, murders and plane crashes fit well with this schedule

Photo-opportunities are staged to fit in with schedules Usually stories run for only one day; after this newspapers need to

find a new angle to give continuity What news fits this in your newspapers? New Media Technology changing this? News media all have

websites…

31st August 1997

Negativity

Bad news is more exciting than good news. Stories about death, tragedy, bankruptcy, violence,

damage, natural disasters, political upheaval or simply extreme weather conditions are always rated above positive stories  

Bad news stories are more likely to be reported than good news because they are more likely to score high on other news values, such as unexpectedness, unambiguity and meaningfulness

How many bad vs. good stories in the first few pages of your newspaper?

Unexpectedness

If an event is out of the ordinary it will be more likely to make it into the news than an everyday occurrence would.

As Charles A. Dana famously put it: "if a dog bites a man, that's not news. But if a man bites a dog, that's news!"

How much of newspaper news is unexpected news?

Predictability

media fulfil their own expectations – Stories in January about how the country

is brought to a halt by snow. Reporting of football hooligans when major

English clubs play abroad. (Expect fighting and therefore report any incidents)

Unambiguity

Events which are easy to grasp make for better copy than those which are open to more than one interpretation, or where understanding of the implications depends on first understanding the complex background to the event.

What techniques does your newspaper use to simplify the news?

Leads to polarisation to avoid complexities?

Personalisation

People are interested in people. News stories that centre on a particular person, and are

presented from a human interest angle, are likely to make the front page, particularly if they involve a well-known person.

Some people claim this news value has become distorted, and that news editors over-rate personality stories, especially those involving celebrities. (Strinati – style over substance…)

A larger news story will often be personalised eg. NHS cutbacks is a huge, complex story, but will be

made less ambiguous by featuring one little old lady who has had her hip operation cancelled…

Find eg. of personalisation in your newspaper

Reference to elite nations

Stories concerned with global powers receive more attention than those dealing with less influential nations.

This also relates to cultural proximity. Those nations which are culturally closest to our own will receive most of the coverage.

So, our news focuses on Europe and America…

Reference to elite persons

The media pay attention to the rich, powerful, famous and infamous. Stories about important people get the most coverage.

Hence, the American President gets more coverage than your local councillor (except perhaps in local paper...)

If I got bitten by one of my dogs and needed a plaster, it wouldn’t make the papers…

Narrativisation

Items are called “stories” from the start and shaped into narrative form as soon as possible.

Eg. Royals and celebrities are presented as long-running sagas, with shifting characters of heroes and villains.

Eg 2. During war, stories of women waiting at home whilst their men fight.

Composition Stories must compete with one another for space in the

media. Editors will seek to provide a balance of different types of

coverage (depending on their audience – tabloids = more celebrity news; broadsheets = more hard news)

If there is an excess of foreign news, for instance, the least important foreign story may have to make way for an inconsequential item of domestic news.

In this way the prominence given to a story depends not only on its own news value but also on those of competing stories. This is a matter of the editors' judgement, more than anything else.

In a broadsheet, what range of stories are there in the first 3 pages?

Pragmatics of media coverage

Galtung and Ruge’s analysis cites pragmatic (practical) reasons why certain news stories are not reported. 

For instance, the mass Burmese demonstration in 1988 failed to receive much media attention because the hostile regime of General Ne Win barred overseas journalists from the country. 

By contrast, the mass demonstration in 2007 received far more attention because civilians themselves had the technology, with modern mobile phones and camcorders, to send instant messages and pictures out of the country to a waiting international media such as Reuters, BBC and CNN.

New technology is increasingly changing the news available…

Pragmatics of media coverage

Galtung and Ruge argued that journalists tend to select stories with a high news value, that is, a high score on one or more of the news factors.   It is unlikely that a story will exhibit all of these.

What we’ve covered…

Threshold Visual Imperative Proximity Continuity Frequency Negativity Predictability Unexpectedness Unambiguity Narrativisation Personalisation Composition

Most likely ones you’ll use:

Crossing the threshold (this story crossed the threshold because…) Visual Imperative (the dramatic visual imperative here is clearly

what caused this story to cross the threshold…) Negativity (newspapers frequently use negativity…) Unambiguity (with limited space in a newspaper, this story fits the

requirement of unambiguity as…/ in order to ensure that the tabloid audience understand this, potential ambiguity has been removed by the use of a simple diagram detailing the medical procedure undergone by the Duke of Edinburgh…)

Personalisation (at this point the story has been personalised, by giving the narrative example of just one of the many people affected by this event…)

Reference to elite persons (has enabled the newspaper to gain the immediate attention of their audience…)