OLD-GROWTH FORESTS ON NETWORK NEWS NEWS SOURCES AND THE FRAMING OF AN ENVIRONMENTAL CONTROVERSY

By Caroiacute M Liebler and ]acob Bendix

The ohi-growth forest debate involves tiigto sides (procut and pro-save) presenting competing views of the issue Television news stories may reflect one or theOther af theseframes through (1) choice of sources (2) choiceof visualsand (3) reporters summary remarks IVf examined four j ears of coverage on ABC CBSand NBC and found that while the distribution of visuals was inconclusive source use and reporter wrap-ups predominantly reflected Ihe procut frame This may be because the procut frame emphasized an unambiguous conflict that was more ameshynable to brief explanations

Americans rely moriacute on television than any other news outlet and roughly a quarter of them Lite broadcast news as their primary source for environmental news1 Moreover although television may be perceived as less factual than dailynewspapers viewers stillfind it morebelievable1 But when it comes to environmental reporting how well founded is this trust How do the networks portray disparate views when covering ecological controversy This paper explores these issuesbv examiningnetwork framshying of the old-growth forest-spotted owl controversy

The quality of environmental reporting is criticalgiven its potential impact Ader documented anagenda-settingeffect forenvironmental pollushytion11 andas environmentalissuesare often unobtrusive-ie thepublic has little first-handknowledgeof orcontact with them -the likelihood of amedia agenda-setting effect is intensified But agenda setting does not imply knowledgegain Inone recent studystudents whorelied oil television news rather than other informationsources had less cognitive knowledge about greenhouse gases and their sources and the most inaccurate view of preshydicted effects of possible global warming5 Simitar findings have been reported for acid rain- watching television news had a negative effect on environmental knowledge

Previous studies of media coverage offer some insight as to why Americans are not better informedon this range of environmental issues 1 his line of research reveals that environmental reporting isoften crisis- or event-oriented Such an approach may beconsistent with traditionalnews values1 but fails toeffectively report onthe underlyingissues thatlead to the crisis News coverage often lacks explanation of scientific concepb and processes111 or fails to accurately explain competing theories of causes of

Carol M- Liebler is a visiting associate professor at the SL Neivhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse Universityand acob Bendix is an assistant professor in the Department ofGeography and a senior research associate m the Center for Environmental Policy and Administration at the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University Theauthors thank iexclohn Lynchfor access tothe Vanderbitt Television News Archives and iexcludy Butler for research assistance

[iquestVMC

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OW-Gkpwth Fiwr5T5tfNmw mMm NcwsSi AVIJ TME FJWAUNESltt AN ENVIM wmeWOW CONTKOWK-SI 53

environmental degradation11 And mobilizing information - information that wouldenable thepublic toactively respond to environmentsI problems - is often lacking in news reports11

Journalists selection and portrayal of newssources is central to this problem News sources influence reporting as journalists rely on tbem for story topics andcontent13 Molotch andLester arguedin their analysis of the 1969 SantaBarbara oilspill that thenews wasframed by the sourceswith the most access to journalists14 More recent studies provide evidence that environmental snurces like those found in other types of news15 are most frequentlvgovernmentrepresentatives1f The dominanee ofany onetype of source governmentalor otherwise may in turn affect how the media frame environmental issues

Source selection in turnmay reflect individual journalist judgment or organizational factors Where the latter is thecase the framing of issues may be indirectly determined by thenetworks Ifas somehavesuggested17

themajornetworks have indistinguishableapproaches to the news theresult would be a near-monolithic frame

Tileconcept oi framingiscentral toinunderstandingof themedia fole inshapingenvironmentaldebate According toEntmanto frameis toselect some aspects of a perceived reality and make them more salient in a communicating text in such a way as to promote a particular problem definitioncausal interpretationmoraL evaluationandor treatmentrecomshymendation1 Frames are actual characteristics of news texts as well as strategies for journalistic construction and audience processing Ln their effort to provide a systematic theoretical framework of framing Pan and Kosirki propose several framing devices among them syntactical and thematic and rhetorical structures Syntacticalstructures include thesequenshytial elementsof a story as well as strategies such as expert source attribushytion Thematic structures which consist of a main body ami summary represent the central idea running throughout the story These may be evidenced inelements such as backgroundinformation or quotes Choices made by journalists reflect rhetorical structures which help promote the supposed factual nature of the news story11 The concept of salience Is therefore key to framing of news texts - the idea thatcertainelements of the story may be played up in such a way as to convey a dominant meaning Salience may beachieved through placement repetition and association111

Frames foundin thenews media mavhave their roots elsewhere The information campaigns oiacute environmentalists and the timber industry have produced frames ie competing social realities of the old-growth controshyversy Eachside has engagedinrhetoricalstrategies creating frames which are thenrefrainedby theothergroupwithanantithetical or oppositional

21 context

Background Spotted Oivls and the Old-Growth Forests

The Northern Spotted Owl (SriA flccidentalis caurim henceforth reshyferred to as spotted owl) lives in old-growth conifer forests in western Oregon and Washington and northwesternCalifornia Theexactdefinitions of old-growth forests vary 1 but there is general agreement that they are closed canopy forests dominated by large trees greater than 150 years old and contain numerous dead snags and fallen logs These environmental characteristics are apparently crucial to the owls because they provide suitable nestingsites containthrivingpopulations of theowlsprev species and arestructurally suited to thehunting techniquesused by the owl1 The

1 HWMJJSMpound AampUtf CuumllVWUNMMriacutel A QUAWEKW

environmental degradation11 And mobilizing information - information that wouldenable thepublic toactively respond to environmentsI problems - is often lacking in news reports11

Journalists selection and portrayal of newssources is central to this problem News sources influence reporting as journalists rely on tbem for story topics andcontent13 Molotch andLester arguedin their analysis of the 1969 SantaBarbara oilspill that thenews wasframed by the sourceswith the most access to journalists14 More recent studies provide evidence that environmental snurces like those found in other types of news15 are most frequentlvgovernmentrepresentatives1f The dominanee ofany onetype of source governmentalor otherwise may in turn affect how the media frame environmental issues

Source selection in turnmay reflect individual journalist judgment or organizational factors Where the latter is thecase the framing of issues may be indirectly determined by thenetworks Ifas somehavesuggested17

themajornetworks have indistinguishableapproaches to the news theresult would be a near-monolithic frame

Tileconcept oi framingiscentral toinunderstandingof themedia fole inshapingenvironmentaldebate According toEntmanto frameis toselect some aspects of a perceived reality and make them more salient in a communicating text in such a way as to promote a particular problem definitioncausal interpretationmoraL evaluationandor treatmentrecomshymendation1 Frames are actual characteristics of news texts as well as strategies for journalistic construction and audience processing Ln their effort to provide a systematic theoretical framework of framing Pan and Kosirki propose several framing devices among them syntactical and thematic and rhetorical structures Syntacticalstructures include thesequenshytial elementsof a story as well as strategies such as expert source attribushytion Thematic structures which consist of a main body ami summary represent the central idea running throughout the story These may be evidenced inelements such as backgroundinformation or quotes Choices made by journalists reflect rhetorical structures which help promote the supposed factual nature of the news story11 The concept of salience Is therefore key to framing of news texts - the idea thatcertainelements of the story may be played up in such a way as to convey a dominant meaning Salience may beachieved through placement repetition and association111

Frames foundin thenews media mavhave their roots elsewhere The information campaigns oiacute environmentalists and the timber industry have produced frames ie competing social realities of the old-growth controshyversy Eachside has engagedinrhetoricalstrategies creating frames which are thenrefrainedby theothergroupwithanantithetical or oppositional

21 context

Background Spotted Oivls and the Old-Growth Forests

The Northern Spotted Owl (SriA flccidentalis caurim henceforth reshyferred to as spotted owl) lives in old-growth conifer forests in western Oregon and Washington and northwesternCalifornia Theexactdefinitions of old-growth forests vary 1 but there is general agreement that they are closed canopy forests dominated by large trees greater than 150 years old and contain numerous dead snags and fallen logs These environmental characteristics are apparently crucial to the owls because they provide suitable nestingsites containthrivingpopulations of theowlsprev species and arestructurally suited to thehunting techniquesused by the owl1 The

1 HWMJJSMpound AampUtf CuumllVWUNMMriacutel A QUAWEKW

linkagebetweenspottedowlhabitat andold-growth forests suggeststhat for the spotted owl to survive the old-growth forest must be preserved The implicationsof thisarenot just ecological andbiologicalbut economic and social as well Logging (primarily of old-growth forests) has longbeen an economic mainstay of thePacific Northwest andinmuch of the region ithas cultural importancegoing beyond employment and income generation24

In 1989 the US Fish and Wildlife Service (with prompting by a Federal Court) announced that it considered the spotted owl li threatened species This invoked the provisionsof the lindangered Species Act requirshying that large areas of old-growth forest be set aside and protected from logging although there was disagreement over how much room the owls needed Any substantial logging limitation represented aneconomic shock for both the logging industry and the rural communities that depend on loggingand millingold-growth timber The story was not about anobscure ecological debate there was the immediate prospect of job losses mill closures disrupted tax bases and the loss of a way of life for the people involved With these elements the story became one of national interest

The debate thai followed centered on three related questionsWhat does the actual scientific evidence show regarding the status of the spotted owlWhat actions werenecessary to protectit Andcould those actionsbe justified in terms of the human cost The debate was punctuated by the release ofgovernmental reports-5 addressing the first two questions each of which was challenged by procut interests in die public and the Congress because of the third question3 Research on the first two questions has generally suggested that the owl is indeed threatenedand requires signifishycant limitationof limber harvest tosurvive research on economic impacts of suchreduction is moreambiguous with thecost-beniexclfit balancedependshyingon how benefits are definedand whether thescale oacutefstudy isregional or national^ The debatebecameparticularly visible whenpoliticiansinvolved themselves as with the CodSquadactivity during the Bush Administrashytion and the Timber Summitearly in theClinton Administration

in supporting their positions both procut and prosave proponents havedependedmoreonbasicimagery thanoncitingresearch-1 For thepro-cut side the keyhas been to showhow devastatedcommunities wouldbeby job losses resulting from reduced harvests They have backed these images with argiurients that the owls couldnt possibly need so much land and werent worth the cost if they did For the prosave side the key images contrasted lush old-growth forest with theugly scars ofrecent deareutting They spoke less of the specific requirements of the spotted owl than of the irreplaceable forest (much of it thousands of years old) in which the owl lived and argued that timber industry job losses were due more to timber exports andmechanization than harvestlimits In short environmentalists thematically framed loggers as destroyers of the forest and the timber industry respondedwith economic andhuman impact frames owls versus people These frames werethen offered to themedia where they wererarely challenged for their scientificor economic validity1 although strengths and weaknesses of these arguments havebeen discussed at length elsewhere31

Framing and the Spotted Owl Controversy

Study Objectives

This study applied elementsof framing theory in a primarily quanti-tative examination of network coverage of the old-growth for estspotted owlcontroversy Specifically the study assessed

0iexcljgtGmwni fiarosrs on NiiacutetwohkNews Mws Saunasrnvrm Fn^uincae iWEnvmLWHKmiCounnwaiar 55

Method

(1) the extent to which on-air sources and other cieshyrnenis of stories reflectedthe rhetoric of loggers andenvironshymentalists

(2) thenature andexpertiseof thenewssourcesquoted and theimplications for story framing

(3) the extent to which the story framing reflected the broader ecological and economic issues discussed within the research community

We examined all stories on the old-growth forestspotted owl contshyroversy thatranonABC CBS and NBC over a four-yearperiod April 1989 when theFWS proposedlisting the spottedowl as a threatened species was our startingpoint Theendingpoint (April1993) was themostrecent month for which tapes of news stories were available All relevant stories listedin theVanderbiltTelevisionArchives Indexwerecoded fromvideot apesof the stories at the Vanderbilt Archives in Nashville Tennessee

The coding scheme focused on variables designed to quantify the syntactical and rhetorical frame elements discussed by Pan and Kosicki These included characteristicsof the storyitself andofeach sourceappearing in thestory Both of these (story and sourcecharacteristics) contributeto the frame elements discussed above and Ihus to the overall construction of the story frame

Storv characteristics measured were network (ABC CBSor NBC) reporter (name) peg (eg timber summit issue analysts policy decision) type of visuals(owls forest logging shipping etc) and number of sources inthe story We alsonoted the text of thereporter wrap-up Sources within a story may emphasize a prosave ecological perspectivebut a reporter s concluding remarks about job loss may cast doubt on the morality of that stance Alternatively the reporters remarks mav reinforce prior imagery and comment

Source characteristics were also measured name footed identificashytion perspective on the issue (prosave or procut) and its basis economic scientific legal tradition etc) and source setting (professional or nonshyprofessional) Because sources arecentral to the story the construction ofa frame may further be related to source expertise and how it is portrayed Downplaying one sources credentials while highlighting anothers reinshyforces aparticular frame Toassess theappropriatenessof source portrayals we derived objective measures of source expertise from resumes that we solicited from allsources who werecastas experts on theissue (egsources fonted as biologist or logging expert) Variables coded from resumes included number of yearsof experiencehighest degreeattained majorand job title Sources whoappeared instoriestodiscuss theirowrisituations(eg unemployed millworkers) rather thanasbroader experts were assumed to have theknowledge to support their statements and were thereforeomitted from thispart of the analysis

In short We operationalized rhetorical structures by type of visuals source setting and reporter wrap-up^ and syntactical structures by the remainingsource characteristics Completecoderreliability wasattained on the most manifest of content (eg source name) On all other variables including those of a more interpretivenature (egperspective on the issue) the two coders achieved at least 80 intercoder reliability

tMJflNALSMamp MASSCiMUUNlLjUltW 56

The threenetworks ran46stories duringthe four-yearperiodstudied Oiacute these 544 or 25 stories were reporter packages with nearly the same number of thesestories appearingoneachnetwork (ABC and NBCeachran eight stories CBS ran nine) The remaining 21 stories were anchor reads again rather evenly split across networks

Policy was the news peg for 50 of the 46 stories followed by President Clintons 1993 timber conference (19ti) issue analysis (8 7) court rulings (65)protest (65) CodSquad hearings(43) andother (43) The number of storiesvaried across time withmore stories appearshyingin 1990and1992 thaninother years Duetothe absencesof sources in the anchor reads analyses that include source data are limited to the reporter packages The average number of sources used per packaged story was 45 alt]lough thisnumber is skewed by onestory with 13sources Overall there Were 113 sourceappearances in thepackaged stories representing 84indishyviduals

Viewpoints of Sources ami Stories To the extent that the views expressed by newssources influencedie framingof the issue theresult was sympathetic to the procut side More than half of the sources emphasized procot views while less than a third were prosave (the remainder being neulxal) As Table1shows this wasdue to imbalance on CBSand ABC aacutes NBC managed aneven division between the opposing viewpoints

Not surprisingly the views of sources reflected their occupations (Table 2) Timber industry employees and lobbyists - the most frequently quoted sources were generally supportive of continued cutting whereas representatives of environmental groups almostuniformlyopposed it The private cituens appearing in the stories were not a classic person on the street cross-sectionas most of them were interviewed atprulogging demshyonstrations or cafes inlogging towns The inclusion of separate classificashytions for Torest Service and the more general Government Official reflects the formers direct involvement inforest management whereas the latter were politically interested officials such as congresspersons county supervisors andhigh leveacute) administratorsincluding twopresidents) The latter group was clearly more prone to support logging than the Forest Service sources This finding reveals Ihe need to distinguishamong official sources as they may varyin their viewpoints Italso suggests that assumpshytions that the oft-cited prominence of government sources34 will result in

tits (ttid Discussion

TABLEI Views Expressed in Source Appearances In Network

Viewpoint of ABC sources of CBS sources

Prosave 3333 2545

Froeut 5556 60(X)

Neutral 1111 1455

Total 100 100 (rt=27) (n=55)

of NBCsources

4104

4194

1613

100 (laquo=31)

Vlt igt lrtlA1bull V K gtY VH-TRX FKMMIacuteM k VV X Mi CoWK11l A - 57

TABLE 2 Victim Expressed in Source Appvimmces tn Occupation

Viewpoint Logger Governshyor mill Timber Private Environ- ment Forest Business- Other worker Lobbyist Citizen mental Official Service person

() () lt) () () () f) ()

Prosave 263 000 3000 9500 1905 10000 000 6250 Procut 8158 9000 7000 000 5714 000 5000 1250 Neutral 1579 1000 000 500 2381 000 5000 2500

Total 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 (71=38) (H-10) (laquo=10) (laquo=20) (ii=21) (H=4) ltH=2) (raquo=8)

dominance of asingleperspectivemay oversimplifyreality Furthermorein this instance the official voice wassomewhat mutedby sources directly involved in the conflict Government officials were quoted less frequently than were timber industry employees andlobbyists (Table 2)

The linkagebetween sourcetype and viewpoint (Table 2) means that source choices largely influenced story frames with notable patterns by network Table 3) On CBS for example almost44 of sourceappearances were by either timber workers or timber lobbyists and fewer than 11 were affiliated with environmental groups whereas the ratio on ARC was two to one These differencesdonot necessarilyreflect aninsidiousnetworkpolicy They mayhowever be indicative of routine newsgatheringpatterns or the tendencies of individual reporters to seek out particular types of sources iherearea variety of reasons why reportersmay beconsistentin their source choices33

The cumulative effect of these decisions was that the networks to varying degree put more sources on the air that favored cutting the forest than favored saving it In this instance the preference in source type trtav havereflected the fact that timber industry workersseemed more inunedi-

TABLE 3 Occupation of Sources Appearing on Each Network

Occupation rif ABC sources ofCBS sources of NBC souiexclees

Logger or Mill Worker 3333 3636 2903 Timber Lobbyist 1481 727 645 Private Citizen 000 1273 968 Environmental 2593 1091 2258 Government Official 1852 1818 1935 Forest Service 000 545 323 Busixtessperson 000 364 000 Other 741 545 968

Total 100 100 100 (laquo=27) (n=55) ltn=31)

58 JOURNALISMampMASS CuumlMMUNiacuteCtfJuumlNQuAJtiXftrt

The threenetworks ran46stories duringthe four-yearperiodstudied Oiacute these 544 or 25 stories were reporter packages with nearly the same number of thesestories appearingoneachnetwork (ABC and NBCeachran eight stories CBS ran nine) The remaining 21 stories were anchor reads again rather evenly split across networks

Policy was the news peg for 50 of the 46 stories followed by President Clintons 1993 timber conference (19ti) issue analysis (8 7) court rulings (65)protest (65) CodSquad hearings(43) andother (43) The number of storiesvaried across time withmore stories appearshyingin 1990and1992 thaninother years Duetothe absencesof sources in the anchor reads analyses that include source data are limited to the reporter packages The average number of sources used per packaged story was 45 alt]lough thisnumber is skewed by onestory with 13sources Overall there Were 113 sourceappearances in thepackaged stories representing 84indishyviduals

Viewpoints of Sources ami Stories To the extent that the views expressed by newssources influencedie framingof the issue theresult was sympathetic to the procut side More than half of the sources emphasized procot views while less than a third were prosave (the remainder being neulxal) As Table1shows this wasdue to imbalance on CBSand ABC aacutes NBC managed aneven division between the opposing viewpoints

Not surprisingly the views of sources reflected their occupations (Table 2) Timber industry employees and lobbyists - the most frequently quoted sources were generally supportive of continued cutting whereas representatives of environmental groups almostuniformlyopposed it The private cituens appearing in the stories were not a classic person on the street cross-sectionas most of them were interviewed atprulogging demshyonstrations or cafes inlogging towns The inclusion of separate classificashytions for Torest Service and the more general Government Official reflects the formers direct involvement inforest management whereas the latter were politically interested officials such as congresspersons county supervisors andhigh leveacute) administratorsincluding twopresidents) The latter group was clearly more prone to support logging than the Forest Service sources This finding reveals Ihe need to distinguishamong official sources as they may varyin their viewpoints Italso suggests that assumpshytions that the oft-cited prominence of government sources34 will result in

tits (ttid Discussion

TABLEI Views Expressed in Source Appearances In Network

Viewpoint of ABC sources of CBS sources

Prosave 3333 2545

Froeut 5556 60(X)

Neutral 1111 1455

Total 100 100 (rt=27) (n=55)

of NBCsources

4104

4194

1613

100 (laquo=31)

Vlt igt lrtlA1bull V K gtY VH-TRX FKMMIacuteM k VV X Mi CoWK11l A - 57

TABLE 2 Victim Expressed in Source Appvimmces tn Occupation

Viewpoint Logger Governshyor mill Timber Private Environ- ment Forest Business- Other worker Lobbyist Citizen mental Official Service person

() () lt) () () () f) ()

Prosave 263 000 3000 9500 1905 10000 000 6250 Procut 8158 9000 7000 000 5714 000 5000 1250 Neutral 1579 1000 000 500 2381 000 5000 2500

Total 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 (71=38) (H-10) (laquo=10) (laquo=20) (ii=21) (H=4) ltH=2) (raquo=8)

dominance of asingleperspectivemay oversimplifyreality Furthermorein this instance the official voice wassomewhat mutedby sources directly involved in the conflict Government officials were quoted less frequently than were timber industry employees andlobbyists (Table 2)

The linkagebetween sourcetype and viewpoint (Table 2) means that source choices largely influenced story frames with notable patterns by network Table 3) On CBS for example almost44 of sourceappearances were by either timber workers or timber lobbyists and fewer than 11 were affiliated with environmental groups whereas the ratio on ARC was two to one These differencesdonot necessarilyreflect aninsidiousnetworkpolicy They mayhowever be indicative of routine newsgatheringpatterns or the tendencies of individual reporters to seek out particular types of sources iherearea variety of reasons why reportersmay beconsistentin their source choices33

The cumulative effect of these decisions was that the networks to varying degree put more sources on the air that favored cutting the forest than favored saving it In this instance the preference in source type trtav havereflected the fact that timber industry workersseemed more inunedi-

TABLE 3 Occupation of Sources Appearing on Each Network

Occupation rif ABC sources ofCBS sources of NBC souiexclees

Logger or Mill Worker 3333 3636 2903 Timber Lobbyist 1481 727 645 Private Citizen 000 1273 968 Environmental 2593 1091 2258 Government Official 1852 1818 1935 Forest Service 000 545 323 Busixtessperson 000 364 000 Other 741 545 968

Total 100 100 100 (laquo=27) (n=55) ltn=31)

58 JOURNALISMampMASS CuumlMMUNiacuteCtfJuumlNQuAJtiXftrt

TABLE 2 Victim Expressed in Source Appvimmces tn Occupation

Viewpoint Logger Governshyor mill Timber Private Environ- ment Forest Business- Other worker Lobbyist Citizen mental Official Service person

() () lt) () () () f) ()

Prosave 263 000 3000 9500 1905 10000 000 6250 Procut 8158 9000 7000 000 5714 000 5000 1250 Neutral 1579 1000 000 500 2381 000 5000 2500

Total 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 (71=38) (H-10) (laquo=10) (laquo=20) (ii=21) (H=4) ltH=2) (raquo=8)

dominance of asingleperspectivemay oversimplifyreality Furthermorein this instance the official voice wassomewhat mutedby sources directly involved in the conflict Government officials were quoted less frequently than were timber industry employees andlobbyists (Table 2)

The linkagebetween sourcetype and viewpoint (Table 2) means that source choices largely influenced story frames with notable patterns by network Table 3) On CBS for example almost44 of sourceappearances were by either timber workers or timber lobbyists and fewer than 11 were affiliated with environmental groups whereas the ratio on ARC was two to one These differencesdonot necessarilyreflect aninsidiousnetworkpolicy They mayhowever be indicative of routine newsgatheringpatterns or the tendencies of individual reporters to seek out particular types of sources iherearea variety of reasons why reportersmay beconsistentin their source choices33

The cumulative effect of these decisions was that the networks to varying degree put more sources on the air that favored cutting the forest than favored saving it In this instance the preference in source type trtav havereflected the fact that timber industry workersseemed more inunedi-

TABLE 3 Occupation of Sources Appearing on Each Network

Occupation rif ABC sources ofCBS sources of NBC souiexclees

Logger or Mill Worker 3333 3636 2903 Timber Lobbyist 1481 727 645 Private Citizen 000 1273 968 Environmental 2593 1091 2258 Government Official 1852 1818 1935 Forest Service 000 545 323 Busixtessperson 000 364 000 Other 741 545 968

Total 100 100 100 (laquo=27) (n=55) ltn=31)

58 JOURNALISMampMASS CuumlMMUNiacuteCtfJuumlNQuAJtiXftrt

TABLE 4 Views Expressed m Source Appearances by Type of Rationale

Viewpoint Economic Ethical Legal Political Scientific Traditional

Prosave 1053 9231 5714 000 7368 000

Procut 7719 7W 4286 51100 2105 8333

Neutral 1228 000 000 5000 525 1667

Total 100 100 100 100 100 100 ltn=57) (rt=13) ltraquo=7gt Ii=2) (n=llt)J (n=6)

Note Totals donot sum to 113 becausesome sources gave more than onerationale whileothers gave none

ate- they were discussingtheir ownlivelihoodand theirchildrens future whileenvironmentalists seemed tobeadvocates fora birdmost peoplehave never seen or ior even more abstract interests like biodiversity Reporters may alsohavebeenresponding tothe socialenvironment inwliich they were working In the rural communities of the Pacific Northwest from which many of the stories were filed public opinion generally favored the prorut view3 Finally the disparity may simply reflect a more effective public relations effort (framing) by theprocut side

Type of sourcealonedoes not fullvexplain theviewpoihts expressed Many ofthesources wereinoccupations thatdidnot have an obviousreason to support one side or the other and Table 2 shows that even some loggers and environmentalists voiced anomalousviews The stands takenby these sources reflected the criteria they used in attitude formation which were indicative of particular frames Table 4 shows the relationshipbetween the viewsofsourcesand thetypeofreasonor argunient theyprovidedtosupport those views Sources whose expressed concerns related to economic condishytions or preservationof traditionallifestyles wereoverwhelmingly supportshyive of continued timber harvests while those who discussed scientific evidenceor expressedconcern for theethicalaspectsof human-environment Interactions tended to favor forest preservation This finding indicates that source rhetoric remained within the debate as it was framed by the procut and prosavepositions

The framingof a newsstory extendsbeyond sourceappearances and statements however We therefore also concentrated on the visuals in the story and onthereporters concluding remarks Visuals may overridewhat isbeingsaid317 and theconcludingstatement (typically showingthereporter himherself) has the potential both to represent whathas beenportrayedin the story and to set the final tone for it

The visualsappearing most Frequently inanchor reads and packaged stories wereof owls (76of stories) and logging (65) Of notea visual of active loggingcanconvey two possiblemessages to some it may represent the employment that may soon be lost while to others it may be a shocking view of environmental destruction Other visuals used consistently were those of undamaged forests[46) lumber mills (37) and antiowl protests (33) Visuals of forests were typically consistent with a prosave message whilemillsand protest tended tosupport aprocut perspective Interestingly shipping was shown in only 4 (87) stories which may indicate that the

OtP-GsOMTN FusfsrsonNfivkjxkNlwsr Nms Scunxsviacutedthe Fjwjwmgof EMUBOwtNiiiGnmsipWampir 59

TABU 5 Reporter Wrap-ups by Frame with Which They Coincide

Matching frame Number of wrap-ups Example of wrap-up

Matches proaave frame 3

Matches procut frame 12

Matches neither frame t o

prosave side was unsuccessful in arguing that job loss was largely due to timber exports^

We assessed reporter wrap-ups not for overt bias but rather for Whether theirsummaryof theconflict paralleled the framesof onesideor Lhe other Table 5 provides both numerical results and examples of wrap-ups that typified one frame or the other As these numbers show the wrap-ups like thesource usage weremorelikely to favor the procut than the prosave perspective although many cases matched neither frame

Source Expertise Of the 84 individuaacuteisappearingacross the stories 34 of (hem were detrly cast as economic timber or scientific experts We wereable tocontact 22of theseindividuals 20 ofwhomresponded favorably to our request for a resume Thesample size isclearly limitedhere whichis largely a function of the networks (or reporters) choice not to rely on a broaderarrayof expertise-wehad alimitedpopulation withwhich towork

We found no real variation in the manner in which sources were portrayed on air -background visuals were fairly evenly professional and nonprofessional forall types of sources Fonted identificationwas comparashybly ambiguous for all expert types (eg Wilderness Society American Forest Resource Alliance Forest ServiceWorker Inshort theseexperts were porhayedas equally expert But were they

The education levelsof representativesof theenvironmental groups timber industry and Forest Service - the affiliations of the experts- varied only slightly although environmental group members were most likely to hold advanced degrees(three masters two fDsonePhD) For all of the groups college degrees were largely from relevant fields (eg natural scienceplanningandresourcepolicyeconomics andbusiness) Differences are evident however in amount of experience Sources representing the forest service(n=4) had anaverage oacutef 975 yearsof experienceIntheir fonted position Members of environmentalgroups (n=8) averaged 713 yearsand timber industry representatives (u=5 averaged 40 years39

tUMWHUSM 6f MASS CUMMKNKHfTGIf QLMWVKiy 60

Comparison of fori ting patterns with source qualifications showed that the frequently ambiguous footing served to obscure the differences in expertise among sources Widely published scientists withyears of experishyence were juxtaposed with timber lobbyists with minimal professional qualifications1 Since all of the scientists were environmentalists or Forest Service employees (groups that tended to be prosave see Table 2) this diminished the strength of theprosave perspective The credibility of truly expert sources was understatedby this ambiguous fonting the effect being conducive to a procut frame

CoverageofEcological aridEconomic IssuesExpertise on theecology uf thespottedowland the old-growth forestand understandingof thelong-term economic impacts of reduced timber harvests are the result of ongoing research byscholars inthepublicandprivatesectors Throughout theperiod foT which we examined network coverage there was ongoing scholarly discussion and sometimes debate41 about the amount and type of habitat required by owls innovative approaches to forestry that might favor their preservationpopulation dynamicsof thespecieskey structuralcharacterisshyticsofold-growth forests andmote13 Tins growing body of information was ignored in the network coverage whereactual knowledge about the subject ofdebate(owls and forests) was obscuredby the debate(whether topreserve them) itself Tire scientists who arguably know themost about spotted owls and old-growth forests13 were entirely absent from the network news

Similarlytheeconomicquestionsbeingresearched included notonly the costs and benefits of timber harvest reduction but also the economic ripple effects by which those reductionsmight have adverse environmental effectselsewhere5 None of this research wascited inthe newscastsand the economicresearcherswereunusedassources A total of fourstoriesincluded mention nf economic factors (mechanization and whole-log exports) in addition toowlpreservation ascontributing tojob lossesin theindustrybut none explored the economic subtleties in any detail

Again the failure to provide more sophisticated coverage may well reflect the difficulty of encapsulating complex issues in brief news stories rather than a disinclination to provide the whole story ironically Peter Jennings did conclude one reporthy notingIt is not a simple debate about saving jobs or preserving trees (ABC4293) Most viewers would have had to take his word for it had they been depending on network news for their information

Conclusion Ii the controversy over the preservation of spotted owls and old-growth forestsboth sides endeavored to frame theissue in waysthat they perceived would fosterpublic sympathy4 For the procul side this meant definingit as anarrow conflictbetween anobscurebirdand awayof 1ite that supports thousands ofpeople Seen in those terms the peoplelosing their jobs seem more sympathetic than theowlno matterhow cute thelatter may be For the prosave side the goal was to widen theterms of debate framing it as an unfortunatecollision between the need to preserve the ancient and magnificent public resources of the old-growth forest and an industry that was shrinking for a wide rangeuf reasons

It isbeyond the scopeof tills paper to judge their overallsuccess but the coverage we studied generally accorded with the procut frame as indicated hy the rhetoricaland syntactical structures we addressed Source usage visuals andreporter wrap-ups all contribute to the overall framing

OnKiacuteruTtvrw FcmLW lt WNrrtvmml Mn Niws Slt whitesand rutFkamm tx an Envjuinmeniai Cokiw WINSV 61

impact ofa newsstory Of these threeelementsonly visuals lacked a notable preference for the procut frame The majority of sources were procut reflecting a tendency to use sources from occupations that favored that viewpoint Thai imbalance was reinforced by the ways in which sources were portrayed as vague identification often obscured the more expert qualifications of prosave sources Similarly where reporter wrap-ups reshyflected one frame or the other the favored frame was usually procut The absence of coverage of ongoing research and debate on the ecological and economic aspectsof thestoryalso allowed the more simple frame favored by the procut side to come through

These findings neither suggest nor refute any idea of network bias rather they indicate that the relatively concise arguments of theprocut side were more readily amenable to encapsulation in news stories Lack of enterprise is a more likely culprit than bias as there were certainly many aspects of the debate that went unexplored

Vale has argued that societal values areas crucialas scientific knowlshyedge indecidingenvironmental policy issues7 a view endorsed by Thomas et a)w Values arenothowever clearly distinct fromknowledge as people use the knowledge available to them in deciding what is valuable The framing of this environmental controversy (or any other) thus reflects a significant success or failure for one advocacy group or another

NOTES

Iacute Tony Atwater Michael Salwenand Ronald Anderson Media Agenda-Setting with Environmental Issues journalism Quarterly 62 (sumshymer 1985) 393-97 Kris MWilson Learning About Global Warming from Ihe Media (paper presented at the annualmeeting of AEJMC KansasCity MO 1993)

2 Michael)Robinson and AndrewKohutBelievabilityand thePress Public OpinionQuurlviii 52 (summer 1988)174-89

3 Christine R Ader A Longitudinal Study of Agenda Setting for the Issue ofEnvironmental Pollution (paper presentedat theannual meetingof AEJMC KansasCity MO 1993)

4 Ader JA Longitudinal Study Atwater Salwen and Anderson Media Agenda-Setting

5 Wilson LearningAbout 31 6 Thomas A Arcury Susan J Scollay and Timothy P Johnson Sex

Differences in Environmental Concern and Knowledge The Case of Add Rain Seacutet Jiotes 16 (May1987 463-72-

7 See for exampleJacob BendixandCarol M Liebler Environmental Degradation in Brazilian Amazonia Perspectives in US News Media Professional Geographer 43 (November 1991) 474-65 Lee Wilkins and Philip Patterson Risk Analysis and theConstructionof News journal ofCommushynication 37 (summer 1987) 80-92

8 Michael RGreenheacutergDavid B Sachsman Peter M Sandmanand KandiceLSalomons RiskDrama andGeography inCoverage ofEnvironshymentalRiskby NetworkTV journalismQuarterly 66 (summer1989) 267-76

9 Wilkins andPatterson Risk Analysis 10 Marilee LongJocelyn Steinke John Kalter Amy Schwaab Andrew

Savagian Na-ima Jaffer Jae Shim and Wayne Wenel Explanation in Newspaper Science Section News Articles (paper presented at the annual

B B

JPUgMUKW frMtiSCOMMOTtotliON QuAKIt-HY 62

meeting of AEJMC BostonMA 1991) 11 Bendix and Liebier Environmental Degradation 12 Marshel D Rossow and Sharon Dunwoody Inclusion of Useful

DetailinNewspaper Coverageofa High-LevelNuclear WasteSitingGontro-versy lournalism Quarterly 68 (spring 1991) 87-100

13 Dan Berkowitz and Douglas W Beach News Sources and News Context The Effect ol Routine News Conflict and Proximity Journalism Quarterly 70spring1993) 4-12Jane Delano BrownCarl RBybeeStanley T Weardon and Dulciacute e Murdoch Straughan Invisible Power Newspaper News Sources and the Limits of Diversity journalism Quarterly 64 spring 1987) 45-54Leon VSigalSourcesMake theNewsinReading the Nfiacuteosed Robert K Manoff andMichael Schudson (NYPantheon Books 1986)9-3

14 Harvey MolotchandMarilyn Lester News AsFurposiveBehavior On the Strategic Use ofRoutine Events Accidentsand ScandalsAmerican Sociological Review 39 February 1974) 101-12

15 BrownetalInvisiblePowerDCharles WhitneyMarilynFritzler StevenJones SharonMazzarellaand LanaRakow Sourceaacutend Geographic Bias in Network Television News 1982-1984 journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media 33 spring 1989) 159-74

16 Julia B CorbettHas EnvironmentalReporting Cone Global Covshyerage of Atmospheric Oone in Canadian and US Newspapers paper presented at theannual meetingofAEJMCKansas CityMO 1993)Michael R Greenberg Peter M Sandman David B Sachsman and Kandice L Salomone Network Television NewsCoverage of Environmental Risks Environment 31 (March1989)16-2040-44ConradSmithNewsSourcesand Power Elites in News Coverage of the Exxon Valdlz Oii Spill journalism Quarterly 70 (summer 1993) 393-403

17 Daniel RiffeBrenda EllisMomo KRogersRoger LVanOmmeren and Kieran A Woodman Gatekeeping and the Network News Mix journalism Quarterly 63 (slimmer 1986) 315-21Guido HStempel 111 Topic and Story Choice of Five Network Newscasts journalism Quarterly 65 (fall 1988) 750-52

18 Robert M En(man Framing Toward Clarification of a Fractured Paradigm journal of Communication 43 (autumn 1993) 51-58 Others have aso offereddefinitions of framingeg WRussell NeumanMarionRJust andAnnNCriglerCommon Knowledge News and theConstruction cfPolitical Meaning (Chicago University of Chicago Press1992) 60

19 Zhongdang Pan and Gerald M Kosicki Framing Analysis An Approach to News Discourse Political Communication 10 (January-March 1993) 55-75

20 Entman Framing 21 lonathan 1 Gange The Logic of Competing Information Campaigns

Conflict Over Old Grouth and the Spotted Owl Communication Monographs no 60 (Falls Church VASpeechCommunication Association 1993)239-57

22 The varyingdefinitions of old-growth forest are summarized inJack Ward ThomasEric DForsmanJoseph B Lint E Charles MeslowBarry R Noon and JaredVenier AConservation Strategyfor I he Northeriexcl Spotted Oioiexcl Report of the Interagency ScientificCommittee to Addressthe Conservation of theSpottedOwl(PortlandORUnitedStatesGovernment (tintingOffice 1990)

23 Andrew B Carey Scott P Horton and Brian L Bis-well Northern Spotted Owls Influence of Prey Base and Landscape CharacterEcologicalMonoshygraphsno62 (Tempe AZ fxologica] Societyof America1992)223-50 Eric

Faaacutefsntw Nrnv mn News Nrm Smjkceawgtthf Frami^bull bull wax Evvw wwestai CovntovEJLvy 63

D Forsmati K Charles Meslow and Howard M Wight Distribution and Biology of the Spotted Orol in Oregon Wildlife Monographsno 87(Washing-tonDCWildlifeSociety19S4)1-64RolandHLambersonRobert McKeivey Barry RNoon and CurtisVoss ADynamic Analysis of Northern Spotted Owl ViabilityinaFragmentedLandscape ConservatismBiology b (December 1992)935-12

24 William DietrichThe Final forest (NY Simon and Schuster1992) 25 Theseinclude Thomas etal4 ConservationStrategy andUS Departshy

ment of the Interior Determination of Critical Habitat for the Northern Spotted Owl Federal Register 57 no 10 (15 January 1992) 1796-1838

21gt DietrichThe Final Forest Alyson Pytte TimberSpotted Owl Intershyests Find MiddleGround Elusive Congressional Quarterly Weekly Report 4+i (September 1990) 3104-3108 Neil Sampson Lpdating the Old-Growth Wars American Forests (NovemberDecember 1990) 17-21

27 Thomas etalbdquoA Conservation StategyUS Department of Agriculture Forest Service and cooperating agencies Final Supplemental Environmental Impact Statementon Management ofHabitatfor Late-Successionaland Old-Growth Forest Related Species Within the Range of the Northern Spoiled Owl vols 1and 2 (1994) Frances C fames Joint ESAAIRS Review of President Clinton- Plan for theManagement of Forests in thePacific Northwest Bulletin of the Ecological Society of America 75 (June 1994) 69-75

28 Daniel AHagen James W Vincent and PatrickG Welle Benefits of PreservingOld-GrowthForests andthe SpottedOwlContemporary Policy Issues 10 (April 15192) 11-22 ClaireMontgomery and Gardner M Brown Jr Economies of Species Preservation the Spotted Owl Case Contemporary Policy Issues 10 (April 1992) 1-12

29 James DProctor TheOwl the ForestandtheTreesEeo-Ideological Conflict in the Pacific Northwest (PhD diss University of California Berkeley 1992)

30 Mark P Moore Constructing Irreconcilable Conflict the Function of Synecdoche in the Spotted Owl Controversy Communication Monographs no (it) (Falls Church VA Speech Communication Association 19M3) 258-74

31 See for example Mary H Cooper Jobs vs Environment CQ Researcher (May 1992) 411-18 Moore Constructing Irreconcilable Conflict James D ProctorEnvironmentalEthicsEco-ideologiesand thePossibility of MoralRealism (paperpresented at the annual meetingof the Association of American Geographers Atlanta GA1993)

32 Pan and KosickiFraming Analysis 33 In thediscussionofquantitativeresultsSources isused torepresent

source appearances forexampleone individualwho was interviewedin two stories would be counted as two sources

34 Leon V Sigal Reporters and Officials (Lexington MA DC Heath 1973) Brown et al Invisible Tower Whitney et al Source and Geoshygraphic Bias

35 Herbert J Gans Deciding Whats News (NY Random House 1979) 36 Proctor EnvironmentalEthics 37 Doris AGraber Processing the NewsHozo People Tame the Information

Tide 2d ed (White Plains NY Longman Inc1988) 38 Our examinationof visualsalso revealed that thenetworks tended to

use thesame stock footageacross the four-year time period While this isnot injierently problematic it was troubling when on at least one occasion the forest shown was recognizably located in the RockyMountains rather than the PacificNorthwest

JouxkalismampMasiacute

39 Resumes for threemembers of theselatter groups diet notprovide this information

40 For example when he was sourced David Wilcove was Senior Ecologist forThe WildernessSociety held aPhD fromPrincetonUniversity in biologyandhad authoredor iquestlaquoauthored twenty-six articleson conservashytionbiology Hewasfontedonly as TheWildernessSociety SimilarlyJack WardThomaswas fontedasBiologistUSForestService Thomas thelead author of the interagency report onconservation of the spotted owlheld a PhD in Forestry and had written more than 250 publications on wildlife biology The other expert source appearing in the story was fonted as Oregon Lands Coalition The latter source was indeed an officer of the Oregon Lands Coalitionand the qualificationlisted in that individualsbio include a high school diploma and descent from three generations of lumbermen Despite the apparently major differences in the expertise of these sources they were all fonted in a comparable manner- there was no way for an audience member to distinguish among their qualifications as NBC portrayed them as equally expert

41 Anna MGillis TheNew Forestry BiuSaejjtr 40 (September 1990) 558-63

42 See for example William BoothNew Thinking on Old Growth Science 244 (April1989) 141-43Frederick J Swanson andJerry T Franklin New Forestry Principles from Ecosystem Analysis of Pacific Northwest Forests Ecological Applications 2 (August 1992) 2iacutei2-74

43 For example wideiv published experts such as trie Forsman of the Forest Service Jerry Franklin of the Forest Service and the University of Washington and Charles Meslow of the Fish and Wildlife Service and Oregon State University

44 See for exampleHagenet alBenefits ofPreservingMontgomery and Brown Economics of Species Presenation

45 Peter Koch Wood Versus Nonwood Materials in USResidential Construction Some Energy-Related Global Implications Forest Products journal 42 (May 1992) 31-42

46 Dietrich The Final Forest Lange The Logic of Competing Information Campaigns MooreConstructingIrreconcilableConflict ProctorThe Owl the Forest

47 ThomasR ValeObjectivity Values and the Redwoods Landscape 19 (winter 1970) 30-33 Thomas R Vale Clearcut Logging Vegetahon Dvnamicsand HumanWisdomGeographical fceinew 78 (October1988)375-86

48 Thomas et al A Conservation Stalegy

itradeFt iwstsiw NrnvimNiiv News SiliketradeMS Fiwmimbull a an poundwilaquommeotuCtwntiWAW 65

Copyright of Journalism amp Mass Communication Quarterly is the property of Association for Education in Journalism amp Mass Communication and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holders express written permission However users may print download or email articles for individual use

TABU 5 Reporter Wrap-ups by Frame with Which They Coincide

Matching frame Number of wrap-ups Example of wrap-up

Matches proaave frame 3

Matches procut frame 12

Matches neither frame t o

prosave side was unsuccessful in arguing that job loss was largely due to timber exports^

We assessed reporter wrap-ups not for overt bias but rather for Whether theirsummaryof theconflict paralleled the framesof onesideor Lhe other Table 5 provides both numerical results and examples of wrap-ups that typified one frame or the other As these numbers show the wrap-ups like thesource usage weremorelikely to favor the procut than the prosave perspective although many cases matched neither frame

Source Expertise Of the 84 individuaacuteisappearingacross the stories 34 of (hem were detrly cast as economic timber or scientific experts We wereable tocontact 22of theseindividuals 20 ofwhomresponded favorably to our request for a resume Thesample size isclearly limitedhere whichis largely a function of the networks (or reporters) choice not to rely on a broaderarrayof expertise-wehad alimitedpopulation withwhich towork

We found no real variation in the manner in which sources were portrayed on air -background visuals were fairly evenly professional and nonprofessional forall types of sources Fonted identificationwas comparashybly ambiguous for all expert types (eg Wilderness Society American Forest Resource Alliance Forest ServiceWorker Inshort theseexperts were porhayedas equally expert But were they

The education levelsof representativesof theenvironmental groups timber industry and Forest Service - the affiliations of the experts- varied only slightly although environmental group members were most likely to hold advanced degrees(three masters two fDsonePhD) For all of the groups college degrees were largely from relevant fields (eg natural scienceplanningandresourcepolicyeconomics andbusiness) Differences are evident however in amount of experience Sources representing the forest service(n=4) had anaverage oacutef 975 yearsof experienceIntheir fonted position Members of environmentalgroups (n=8) averaged 713 yearsand timber industry representatives (u=5 averaged 40 years39

tUMWHUSM 6f MASS CUMMKNKHfTGIf QLMWVKiy 60

Comparison of fori ting patterns with source qualifications showed that the frequently ambiguous footing served to obscure the differences in expertise among sources Widely published scientists withyears of experishyence were juxtaposed with timber lobbyists with minimal professional qualifications1 Since all of the scientists were environmentalists or Forest Service employees (groups that tended to be prosave see Table 2) this diminished the strength of theprosave perspective The credibility of truly expert sources was understatedby this ambiguous fonting the effect being conducive to a procut frame

CoverageofEcological aridEconomic IssuesExpertise on theecology uf thespottedowland the old-growth forestand understandingof thelong-term economic impacts of reduced timber harvests are the result of ongoing research byscholars inthepublicandprivatesectors Throughout theperiod foT which we examined network coverage there was ongoing scholarly discussion and sometimes debate41 about the amount and type of habitat required by owls innovative approaches to forestry that might favor their preservationpopulation dynamicsof thespecieskey structuralcharacterisshyticsofold-growth forests andmote13 Tins growing body of information was ignored in the network coverage whereactual knowledge about the subject ofdebate(owls and forests) was obscuredby the debate(whether topreserve them) itself Tire scientists who arguably know themost about spotted owls and old-growth forests13 were entirely absent from the network news

Similarlytheeconomicquestionsbeingresearched included notonly the costs and benefits of timber harvest reduction but also the economic ripple effects by which those reductionsmight have adverse environmental effectselsewhere5 None of this research wascited inthe newscastsand the economicresearcherswereunusedassources A total of fourstoriesincluded mention nf economic factors (mechanization and whole-log exports) in addition toowlpreservation ascontributing tojob lossesin theindustrybut none explored the economic subtleties in any detail

Again the failure to provide more sophisticated coverage may well reflect the difficulty of encapsulating complex issues in brief news stories rather than a disinclination to provide the whole story ironically Peter Jennings did conclude one reporthy notingIt is not a simple debate about saving jobs or preserving trees (ABC4293) Most viewers would have had to take his word for it had they been depending on network news for their information

Conclusion Ii the controversy over the preservation of spotted owls and old-growth forestsboth sides endeavored to frame theissue in waysthat they perceived would fosterpublic sympathy4 For the procul side this meant definingit as anarrow conflictbetween anobscurebirdand awayof 1ite that supports thousands ofpeople Seen in those terms the peoplelosing their jobs seem more sympathetic than theowlno matterhow cute thelatter may be For the prosave side the goal was to widen theterms of debate framing it as an unfortunatecollision between the need to preserve the ancient and magnificent public resources of the old-growth forest and an industry that was shrinking for a wide rangeuf reasons

It isbeyond the scopeof tills paper to judge their overallsuccess but the coverage we studied generally accorded with the procut frame as indicated hy the rhetoricaland syntactical structures we addressed Source usage visuals andreporter wrap-ups all contribute to the overall framing

OnKiacuteruTtvrw FcmLW lt WNrrtvmml Mn Niws Slt whitesand rutFkamm tx an Envjuinmeniai Cokiw WINSV 61

impact ofa newsstory Of these threeelementsonly visuals lacked a notable preference for the procut frame The majority of sources were procut reflecting a tendency to use sources from occupations that favored that viewpoint Thai imbalance was reinforced by the ways in which sources were portrayed as vague identification often obscured the more expert qualifications of prosave sources Similarly where reporter wrap-ups reshyflected one frame or the other the favored frame was usually procut The absence of coverage of ongoing research and debate on the ecological and economic aspectsof thestoryalso allowed the more simple frame favored by the procut side to come through

These findings neither suggest nor refute any idea of network bias rather they indicate that the relatively concise arguments of theprocut side were more readily amenable to encapsulation in news stories Lack of enterprise is a more likely culprit than bias as there were certainly many aspects of the debate that went unexplored

Vale has argued that societal values areas crucialas scientific knowlshyedge indecidingenvironmental policy issues7 a view endorsed by Thomas et a)w Values arenothowever clearly distinct fromknowledge as people use the knowledge available to them in deciding what is valuable The framing of this environmental controversy (or any other) thus reflects a significant success or failure for one advocacy group or another

NOTES

Iacute Tony Atwater Michael Salwenand Ronald Anderson Media Agenda-Setting with Environmental Issues journalism Quarterly 62 (sumshymer 1985) 393-97 Kris MWilson Learning About Global Warming from Ihe Media (paper presented at the annualmeeting of AEJMC KansasCity MO 1993)

2 Michael)Robinson and AndrewKohutBelievabilityand thePress Public OpinionQuurlviii 52 (summer 1988)174-89

3 Christine R Ader A Longitudinal Study of Agenda Setting for the Issue ofEnvironmental Pollution (paper presentedat theannual meetingof AEJMC KansasCity MO 1993)

4 Ader JA Longitudinal Study Atwater Salwen and Anderson Media Agenda-Setting

5 Wilson LearningAbout 31 6 Thomas A Arcury Susan J Scollay and Timothy P Johnson Sex

Differences in Environmental Concern and Knowledge The Case of Add Rain Seacutet Jiotes 16 (May1987 463-72-

7 See for exampleJacob BendixandCarol M Liebler Environmental Degradation in Brazilian Amazonia Perspectives in US News Media Professional Geographer 43 (November 1991) 474-65 Lee Wilkins and Philip Patterson Risk Analysis and theConstructionof News journal ofCommushynication 37 (summer 1987) 80-92

8 Michael RGreenheacutergDavid B Sachsman Peter M Sandmanand KandiceLSalomons RiskDrama andGeography inCoverage ofEnvironshymentalRiskby NetworkTV journalismQuarterly 66 (summer1989) 267-76

9 Wilkins andPatterson Risk Analysis 10 Marilee LongJocelyn Steinke John Kalter Amy Schwaab Andrew

Savagian Na-ima Jaffer Jae Shim and Wayne Wenel Explanation in Newspaper Science Section News Articles (paper presented at the annual

B B

JPUgMUKW frMtiSCOMMOTtotliON QuAKIt-HY 62

meeting of AEJMC BostonMA 1991) 11 Bendix and Liebier Environmental Degradation 12 Marshel D Rossow and Sharon Dunwoody Inclusion of Useful

DetailinNewspaper Coverageofa High-LevelNuclear WasteSitingGontro-versy lournalism Quarterly 68 (spring 1991) 87-100

13 Dan Berkowitz and Douglas W Beach News Sources and News Context The Effect ol Routine News Conflict and Proximity Journalism Quarterly 70spring1993) 4-12Jane Delano BrownCarl RBybeeStanley T Weardon and Dulciacute e Murdoch Straughan Invisible Power Newspaper News Sources and the Limits of Diversity journalism Quarterly 64 spring 1987) 45-54Leon VSigalSourcesMake theNewsinReading the Nfiacuteosed Robert K Manoff andMichael Schudson (NYPantheon Books 1986)9-3

14 Harvey MolotchandMarilyn Lester News AsFurposiveBehavior On the Strategic Use ofRoutine Events Accidentsand ScandalsAmerican Sociological Review 39 February 1974) 101-12

15 BrownetalInvisiblePowerDCharles WhitneyMarilynFritzler StevenJones SharonMazzarellaand LanaRakow Sourceaacutend Geographic Bias in Network Television News 1982-1984 journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media 33 spring 1989) 159-74

16 Julia B CorbettHas EnvironmentalReporting Cone Global Covshyerage of Atmospheric Oone in Canadian and US Newspapers paper presented at theannual meetingofAEJMCKansas CityMO 1993)Michael R Greenberg Peter M Sandman David B Sachsman and Kandice L Salomone Network Television NewsCoverage of Environmental Risks Environment 31 (March1989)16-2040-44ConradSmithNewsSourcesand Power Elites in News Coverage of the Exxon Valdlz Oii Spill journalism Quarterly 70 (summer 1993) 393-403

17 Daniel RiffeBrenda EllisMomo KRogersRoger LVanOmmeren and Kieran A Woodman Gatekeeping and the Network News Mix journalism Quarterly 63 (slimmer 1986) 315-21Guido HStempel 111 Topic and Story Choice of Five Network Newscasts journalism Quarterly 65 (fall 1988) 750-52

18 Robert M En(man Framing Toward Clarification of a Fractured Paradigm journal of Communication 43 (autumn 1993) 51-58 Others have aso offereddefinitions of framingeg WRussell NeumanMarionRJust andAnnNCriglerCommon Knowledge News and theConstruction cfPolitical Meaning (Chicago University of Chicago Press1992) 60

19 Zhongdang Pan and Gerald M Kosicki Framing Analysis An Approach to News Discourse Political Communication 10 (January-March 1993) 55-75

20 Entman Framing 21 lonathan 1 Gange The Logic of Competing Information Campaigns

Conflict Over Old Grouth and the Spotted Owl Communication Monographs no 60 (Falls Church VASpeechCommunication Association 1993)239-57

22 The varyingdefinitions of old-growth forest are summarized inJack Ward ThomasEric DForsmanJoseph B Lint E Charles MeslowBarry R Noon and JaredVenier AConservation Strategyfor I he Northeriexcl Spotted Oioiexcl Report of the Interagency ScientificCommittee to Addressthe Conservation of theSpottedOwl(PortlandORUnitedStatesGovernment (tintingOffice 1990)

23 Andrew B Carey Scott P Horton and Brian L Bis-well Northern Spotted Owls Influence of Prey Base and Landscape CharacterEcologicalMonoshygraphsno62 (Tempe AZ fxologica] Societyof America1992)223-50 Eric

Faaacutefsntw Nrnv mn News Nrm Smjkceawgtthf Frami^bull bull wax Evvw wwestai CovntovEJLvy 63

D Forsmati K Charles Meslow and Howard M Wight Distribution and Biology of the Spotted Orol in Oregon Wildlife Monographsno 87(Washing-tonDCWildlifeSociety19S4)1-64RolandHLambersonRobert McKeivey Barry RNoon and CurtisVoss ADynamic Analysis of Northern Spotted Owl ViabilityinaFragmentedLandscape ConservatismBiology b (December 1992)935-12

24 William DietrichThe Final forest (NY Simon and Schuster1992) 25 Theseinclude Thomas etal4 ConservationStrategy andUS Departshy

ment of the Interior Determination of Critical Habitat for the Northern Spotted Owl Federal Register 57 no 10 (15 January 1992) 1796-1838

21gt DietrichThe Final Forest Alyson Pytte TimberSpotted Owl Intershyests Find MiddleGround Elusive Congressional Quarterly Weekly Report 4+i (September 1990) 3104-3108 Neil Sampson Lpdating the Old-Growth Wars American Forests (NovemberDecember 1990) 17-21

27 Thomas etalbdquoA Conservation StategyUS Department of Agriculture Forest Service and cooperating agencies Final Supplemental Environmental Impact Statementon Management ofHabitatfor Late-Successionaland Old-Growth Forest Related Species Within the Range of the Northern Spoiled Owl vols 1and 2 (1994) Frances C fames Joint ESAAIRS Review of President Clinton- Plan for theManagement of Forests in thePacific Northwest Bulletin of the Ecological Society of America 75 (June 1994) 69-75

28 Daniel AHagen James W Vincent and PatrickG Welle Benefits of PreservingOld-GrowthForests andthe SpottedOwlContemporary Policy Issues 10 (April 15192) 11-22 ClaireMontgomery and Gardner M Brown Jr Economies of Species Preservation the Spotted Owl Case Contemporary Policy Issues 10 (April 1992) 1-12

29 James DProctor TheOwl the ForestandtheTreesEeo-Ideological Conflict in the Pacific Northwest (PhD diss University of California Berkeley 1992)

30 Mark P Moore Constructing Irreconcilable Conflict the Function of Synecdoche in the Spotted Owl Controversy Communication Monographs no (it) (Falls Church VA Speech Communication Association 19M3) 258-74

31 See for example Mary H Cooper Jobs vs Environment CQ Researcher (May 1992) 411-18 Moore Constructing Irreconcilable Conflict James D ProctorEnvironmentalEthicsEco-ideologiesand thePossibility of MoralRealism (paperpresented at the annual meetingof the Association of American Geographers Atlanta GA1993)

32 Pan and KosickiFraming Analysis 33 In thediscussionofquantitativeresultsSources isused torepresent

source appearances forexampleone individualwho was interviewedin two stories would be counted as two sources

34 Leon V Sigal Reporters and Officials (Lexington MA DC Heath 1973) Brown et al Invisible Tower Whitney et al Source and Geoshygraphic Bias

35 Herbert J Gans Deciding Whats News (NY Random House 1979) 36 Proctor EnvironmentalEthics 37 Doris AGraber Processing the NewsHozo People Tame the Information

Tide 2d ed (White Plains NY Longman Inc1988) 38 Our examinationof visualsalso revealed that thenetworks tended to

use thesame stock footageacross the four-year time period While this isnot injierently problematic it was troubling when on at least one occasion the forest shown was recognizably located in the RockyMountains rather than the PacificNorthwest

JouxkalismampMasiacute

39 Resumes for threemembers of theselatter groups diet notprovide this information

40 For example when he was sourced David Wilcove was Senior Ecologist forThe WildernessSociety held aPhD fromPrincetonUniversity in biologyandhad authoredor iquestlaquoauthored twenty-six articleson conservashytionbiology Hewasfontedonly as TheWildernessSociety SimilarlyJack WardThomaswas fontedasBiologistUSForestService Thomas thelead author of the interagency report onconservation of the spotted owlheld a PhD in Forestry and had written more than 250 publications on wildlife biology The other expert source appearing in the story was fonted as Oregon Lands Coalition The latter source was indeed an officer of the Oregon Lands Coalitionand the qualificationlisted in that individualsbio include a high school diploma and descent from three generations of lumbermen Despite the apparently major differences in the expertise of these sources they were all fonted in a comparable manner- there was no way for an audience member to distinguish among their qualifications as NBC portrayed them as equally expert

41 Anna MGillis TheNew Forestry BiuSaejjtr 40 (September 1990) 558-63

42 See for example William BoothNew Thinking on Old Growth Science 244 (April1989) 141-43Frederick J Swanson andJerry T Franklin New Forestry Principles from Ecosystem Analysis of Pacific Northwest Forests Ecological Applications 2 (August 1992) 2iacutei2-74

43 For example wideiv published experts such as trie Forsman of the Forest Service Jerry Franklin of the Forest Service and the University of Washington and Charles Meslow of the Fish and Wildlife Service and Oregon State University

44 See for exampleHagenet alBenefits ofPreservingMontgomery and Brown Economics of Species Presenation

45 Peter Koch Wood Versus Nonwood Materials in USResidential Construction Some Energy-Related Global Implications Forest Products journal 42 (May 1992) 31-42

46 Dietrich The Final Forest Lange The Logic of Competing Information Campaigns MooreConstructingIrreconcilableConflict ProctorThe Owl the Forest

47 ThomasR ValeObjectivity Values and the Redwoods Landscape 19 (winter 1970) 30-33 Thomas R Vale Clearcut Logging Vegetahon Dvnamicsand HumanWisdomGeographical fceinew 78 (October1988)375-86

48 Thomas et al A Conservation Stalegy

itradeFt iwstsiw NrnvimNiiv News SiliketradeMS Fiwmimbull a an poundwilaquommeotuCtwntiWAW 65

Copyright of Journalism amp Mass Communication Quarterly is the property of Association for Education in Journalism amp Mass Communication and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holders express written permission However users may print download or email articles for individual use

Comparison of fori ting patterns with source qualifications showed that the frequently ambiguous footing served to obscure the differences in expertise among sources Widely published scientists withyears of experishyence were juxtaposed with timber lobbyists with minimal professional qualifications1 Since all of the scientists were environmentalists or Forest Service employees (groups that tended to be prosave see Table 2) this diminished the strength of theprosave perspective The credibility of truly expert sources was understatedby this ambiguous fonting the effect being conducive to a procut frame

CoverageofEcological aridEconomic IssuesExpertise on theecology uf thespottedowland the old-growth forestand understandingof thelong-term economic impacts of reduced timber harvests are the result of ongoing research byscholars inthepublicandprivatesectors Throughout theperiod foT which we examined network coverage there was ongoing scholarly discussion and sometimes debate41 about the amount and type of habitat required by owls innovative approaches to forestry that might favor their preservationpopulation dynamicsof thespecieskey structuralcharacterisshyticsofold-growth forests andmote13 Tins growing body of information was ignored in the network coverage whereactual knowledge about the subject ofdebate(owls and forests) was obscuredby the debate(whether topreserve them) itself Tire scientists who arguably know themost about spotted owls and old-growth forests13 were entirely absent from the network news

Similarlytheeconomicquestionsbeingresearched included notonly the costs and benefits of timber harvest reduction but also the economic ripple effects by which those reductionsmight have adverse environmental effectselsewhere5 None of this research wascited inthe newscastsand the economicresearcherswereunusedassources A total of fourstoriesincluded mention nf economic factors (mechanization and whole-log exports) in addition toowlpreservation ascontributing tojob lossesin theindustrybut none explored the economic subtleties in any detail

Again the failure to provide more sophisticated coverage may well reflect the difficulty of encapsulating complex issues in brief news stories rather than a disinclination to provide the whole story ironically Peter Jennings did conclude one reporthy notingIt is not a simple debate about saving jobs or preserving trees (ABC4293) Most viewers would have had to take his word for it had they been depending on network news for their information

Conclusion Ii the controversy over the preservation of spotted owls and old-growth forestsboth sides endeavored to frame theissue in waysthat they perceived would fosterpublic sympathy4 For the procul side this meant definingit as anarrow conflictbetween anobscurebirdand awayof 1ite that supports thousands ofpeople Seen in those terms the peoplelosing their jobs seem more sympathetic than theowlno matterhow cute thelatter may be For the prosave side the goal was to widen theterms of debate framing it as an unfortunatecollision between the need to preserve the ancient and magnificent public resources of the old-growth forest and an industry that was shrinking for a wide rangeuf reasons

It isbeyond the scopeof tills paper to judge their overallsuccess but the coverage we studied generally accorded with the procut frame as indicated hy the rhetoricaland syntactical structures we addressed Source usage visuals andreporter wrap-ups all contribute to the overall framing

OnKiacuteruTtvrw FcmLW lt WNrrtvmml Mn Niws Slt whitesand rutFkamm tx an Envjuinmeniai Cokiw WINSV 61

impact ofa newsstory Of these threeelementsonly visuals lacked a notable preference for the procut frame The majority of sources were procut reflecting a tendency to use sources from occupations that favored that viewpoint Thai imbalance was reinforced by the ways in which sources were portrayed as vague identification often obscured the more expert qualifications of prosave sources Similarly where reporter wrap-ups reshyflected one frame or the other the favored frame was usually procut The absence of coverage of ongoing research and debate on the ecological and economic aspectsof thestoryalso allowed the more simple frame favored by the procut side to come through

These findings neither suggest nor refute any idea of network bias rather they indicate that the relatively concise arguments of theprocut side were more readily amenable to encapsulation in news stories Lack of enterprise is a more likely culprit than bias as there were certainly many aspects of the debate that went unexplored

Vale has argued that societal values areas crucialas scientific knowlshyedge indecidingenvironmental policy issues7 a view endorsed by Thomas et a)w Values arenothowever clearly distinct fromknowledge as people use the knowledge available to them in deciding what is valuable The framing of this environmental controversy (or any other) thus reflects a significant success or failure for one advocacy group or another

NOTES

Iacute Tony Atwater Michael Salwenand Ronald Anderson Media Agenda-Setting with Environmental Issues journalism Quarterly 62 (sumshymer 1985) 393-97 Kris MWilson Learning About Global Warming from Ihe Media (paper presented at the annualmeeting of AEJMC KansasCity MO 1993)

2 Michael)Robinson and AndrewKohutBelievabilityand thePress Public OpinionQuurlviii 52 (summer 1988)174-89

3 Christine R Ader A Longitudinal Study of Agenda Setting for the Issue ofEnvironmental Pollution (paper presentedat theannual meetingof AEJMC KansasCity MO 1993)

4 Ader JA Longitudinal Study Atwater Salwen and Anderson Media Agenda-Setting

5 Wilson LearningAbout 31 6 Thomas A Arcury Susan J Scollay and Timothy P Johnson Sex

Differences in Environmental Concern and Knowledge The Case of Add Rain Seacutet Jiotes 16 (May1987 463-72-

7 See for exampleJacob BendixandCarol M Liebler Environmental Degradation in Brazilian Amazonia Perspectives in US News Media Professional Geographer 43 (November 1991) 474-65 Lee Wilkins and Philip Patterson Risk Analysis and theConstructionof News journal ofCommushynication 37 (summer 1987) 80-92

8 Michael RGreenheacutergDavid B Sachsman Peter M Sandmanand KandiceLSalomons RiskDrama andGeography inCoverage ofEnvironshymentalRiskby NetworkTV journalismQuarterly 66 (summer1989) 267-76

9 Wilkins andPatterson Risk Analysis 10 Marilee LongJocelyn Steinke John Kalter Amy Schwaab Andrew

Savagian Na-ima Jaffer Jae Shim and Wayne Wenel Explanation in Newspaper Science Section News Articles (paper presented at the annual

B B

JPUgMUKW frMtiSCOMMOTtotliON QuAKIt-HY 62

meeting of AEJMC BostonMA 1991) 11 Bendix and Liebier Environmental Degradation 12 Marshel D Rossow and Sharon Dunwoody Inclusion of Useful

DetailinNewspaper Coverageofa High-LevelNuclear WasteSitingGontro-versy lournalism Quarterly 68 (spring 1991) 87-100

13 Dan Berkowitz and Douglas W Beach News Sources and News Context The Effect ol Routine News Conflict and Proximity Journalism Quarterly 70spring1993) 4-12Jane Delano BrownCarl RBybeeStanley T Weardon and Dulciacute e Murdoch Straughan Invisible Power Newspaper News Sources and the Limits of Diversity journalism Quarterly 64 spring 1987) 45-54Leon VSigalSourcesMake theNewsinReading the Nfiacuteosed Robert K Manoff andMichael Schudson (NYPantheon Books 1986)9-3

14 Harvey MolotchandMarilyn Lester News AsFurposiveBehavior On the Strategic Use ofRoutine Events Accidentsand ScandalsAmerican Sociological Review 39 February 1974) 101-12

15 BrownetalInvisiblePowerDCharles WhitneyMarilynFritzler StevenJones SharonMazzarellaand LanaRakow Sourceaacutend Geographic Bias in Network Television News 1982-1984 journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media 33 spring 1989) 159-74

16 Julia B CorbettHas EnvironmentalReporting Cone Global Covshyerage of Atmospheric Oone in Canadian and US Newspapers paper presented at theannual meetingofAEJMCKansas CityMO 1993)Michael R Greenberg Peter M Sandman David B Sachsman and Kandice L Salomone Network Television NewsCoverage of Environmental Risks Environment 31 (March1989)16-2040-44ConradSmithNewsSourcesand Power Elites in News Coverage of the Exxon Valdlz Oii Spill journalism Quarterly 70 (summer 1993) 393-403

17 Daniel RiffeBrenda EllisMomo KRogersRoger LVanOmmeren and Kieran A Woodman Gatekeeping and the Network News Mix journalism Quarterly 63 (slimmer 1986) 315-21Guido HStempel 111 Topic and Story Choice of Five Network Newscasts journalism Quarterly 65 (fall 1988) 750-52

18 Robert M En(man Framing Toward Clarification of a Fractured Paradigm journal of Communication 43 (autumn 1993) 51-58 Others have aso offereddefinitions of framingeg WRussell NeumanMarionRJust andAnnNCriglerCommon Knowledge News and theConstruction cfPolitical Meaning (Chicago University of Chicago Press1992) 60

19 Zhongdang Pan and Gerald M Kosicki Framing Analysis An Approach to News Discourse Political Communication 10 (January-March 1993) 55-75

20 Entman Framing 21 lonathan 1 Gange The Logic of Competing Information Campaigns

Conflict Over Old Grouth and the Spotted Owl Communication Monographs no 60 (Falls Church VASpeechCommunication Association 1993)239-57

22 The varyingdefinitions of old-growth forest are summarized inJack Ward ThomasEric DForsmanJoseph B Lint E Charles MeslowBarry R Noon and JaredVenier AConservation Strategyfor I he Northeriexcl Spotted Oioiexcl Report of the Interagency ScientificCommittee to Addressthe Conservation of theSpottedOwl(PortlandORUnitedStatesGovernment (tintingOffice 1990)

23 Andrew B Carey Scott P Horton and Brian L Bis-well Northern Spotted Owls Influence of Prey Base and Landscape CharacterEcologicalMonoshygraphsno62 (Tempe AZ fxologica] Societyof America1992)223-50 Eric

Faaacutefsntw Nrnv mn News Nrm Smjkceawgtthf Frami^bull bull wax Evvw wwestai CovntovEJLvy 63

D Forsmati K Charles Meslow and Howard M Wight Distribution and Biology of the Spotted Orol in Oregon Wildlife Monographsno 87(Washing-tonDCWildlifeSociety19S4)1-64RolandHLambersonRobert McKeivey Barry RNoon and CurtisVoss ADynamic Analysis of Northern Spotted Owl ViabilityinaFragmentedLandscape ConservatismBiology b (December 1992)935-12

24 William DietrichThe Final forest (NY Simon and Schuster1992) 25 Theseinclude Thomas etal4 ConservationStrategy andUS Departshy

ment of the Interior Determination of Critical Habitat for the Northern Spotted Owl Federal Register 57 no 10 (15 January 1992) 1796-1838

21gt DietrichThe Final Forest Alyson Pytte TimberSpotted Owl Intershyests Find MiddleGround Elusive Congressional Quarterly Weekly Report 4+i (September 1990) 3104-3108 Neil Sampson Lpdating the Old-Growth Wars American Forests (NovemberDecember 1990) 17-21

27 Thomas etalbdquoA Conservation StategyUS Department of Agriculture Forest Service and cooperating agencies Final Supplemental Environmental Impact Statementon Management ofHabitatfor Late-Successionaland Old-Growth Forest Related Species Within the Range of the Northern Spoiled Owl vols 1and 2 (1994) Frances C fames Joint ESAAIRS Review of President Clinton- Plan for theManagement of Forests in thePacific Northwest Bulletin of the Ecological Society of America 75 (June 1994) 69-75

28 Daniel AHagen James W Vincent and PatrickG Welle Benefits of PreservingOld-GrowthForests andthe SpottedOwlContemporary Policy Issues 10 (April 15192) 11-22 ClaireMontgomery and Gardner M Brown Jr Economies of Species Preservation the Spotted Owl Case Contemporary Policy Issues 10 (April 1992) 1-12

29 James DProctor TheOwl the ForestandtheTreesEeo-Ideological Conflict in the Pacific Northwest (PhD diss University of California Berkeley 1992)

30 Mark P Moore Constructing Irreconcilable Conflict the Function of Synecdoche in the Spotted Owl Controversy Communication Monographs no (it) (Falls Church VA Speech Communication Association 19M3) 258-74

31 See for example Mary H Cooper Jobs vs Environment CQ Researcher (May 1992) 411-18 Moore Constructing Irreconcilable Conflict James D ProctorEnvironmentalEthicsEco-ideologiesand thePossibility of MoralRealism (paperpresented at the annual meetingof the Association of American Geographers Atlanta GA1993)

32 Pan and KosickiFraming Analysis 33 In thediscussionofquantitativeresultsSources isused torepresent

source appearances forexampleone individualwho was interviewedin two stories would be counted as two sources

34 Leon V Sigal Reporters and Officials (Lexington MA DC Heath 1973) Brown et al Invisible Tower Whitney et al Source and Geoshygraphic Bias

35 Herbert J Gans Deciding Whats News (NY Random House 1979) 36 Proctor EnvironmentalEthics 37 Doris AGraber Processing the NewsHozo People Tame the Information

Tide 2d ed (White Plains NY Longman Inc1988) 38 Our examinationof visualsalso revealed that thenetworks tended to

use thesame stock footageacross the four-year time period While this isnot injierently problematic it was troubling when on at least one occasion the forest shown was recognizably located in the RockyMountains rather than the PacificNorthwest

JouxkalismampMasiacute

39 Resumes for threemembers of theselatter groups diet notprovide this information

40 For example when he was sourced David Wilcove was Senior Ecologist forThe WildernessSociety held aPhD fromPrincetonUniversity in biologyandhad authoredor iquestlaquoauthored twenty-six articleson conservashytionbiology Hewasfontedonly as TheWildernessSociety SimilarlyJack WardThomaswas fontedasBiologistUSForestService Thomas thelead author of the interagency report onconservation of the spotted owlheld a PhD in Forestry and had written more than 250 publications on wildlife biology The other expert source appearing in the story was fonted as Oregon Lands Coalition The latter source was indeed an officer of the Oregon Lands Coalitionand the qualificationlisted in that individualsbio include a high school diploma and descent from three generations of lumbermen Despite the apparently major differences in the expertise of these sources they were all fonted in a comparable manner- there was no way for an audience member to distinguish among their qualifications as NBC portrayed them as equally expert

41 Anna MGillis TheNew Forestry BiuSaejjtr 40 (September 1990) 558-63

42 See for example William BoothNew Thinking on Old Growth Science 244 (April1989) 141-43Frederick J Swanson andJerry T Franklin New Forestry Principles from Ecosystem Analysis of Pacific Northwest Forests Ecological Applications 2 (August 1992) 2iacutei2-74

43 For example wideiv published experts such as trie Forsman of the Forest Service Jerry Franklin of the Forest Service and the University of Washington and Charles Meslow of the Fish and Wildlife Service and Oregon State University

44 See for exampleHagenet alBenefits ofPreservingMontgomery and Brown Economics of Species Presenation

45 Peter Koch Wood Versus Nonwood Materials in USResidential Construction Some Energy-Related Global Implications Forest Products journal 42 (May 1992) 31-42

46 Dietrich The Final Forest Lange The Logic of Competing Information Campaigns MooreConstructingIrreconcilableConflict ProctorThe Owl the Forest

47 ThomasR ValeObjectivity Values and the Redwoods Landscape 19 (winter 1970) 30-33 Thomas R Vale Clearcut Logging Vegetahon Dvnamicsand HumanWisdomGeographical fceinew 78 (October1988)375-86

48 Thomas et al A Conservation Stalegy

itradeFt iwstsiw NrnvimNiiv News SiliketradeMS Fiwmimbull a an poundwilaquommeotuCtwntiWAW 65

Copyright of Journalism amp Mass Communication Quarterly is the property of Association for Education in Journalism amp Mass Communication and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holders express written permission However users may print download or email articles for individual use

impact ofa newsstory Of these threeelementsonly visuals lacked a notable preference for the procut frame The majority of sources were procut reflecting a tendency to use sources from occupations that favored that viewpoint Thai imbalance was reinforced by the ways in which sources were portrayed as vague identification often obscured the more expert qualifications of prosave sources Similarly where reporter wrap-ups reshyflected one frame or the other the favored frame was usually procut The absence of coverage of ongoing research and debate on the ecological and economic aspectsof thestoryalso allowed the more simple frame favored by the procut side to come through

These findings neither suggest nor refute any idea of network bias rather they indicate that the relatively concise arguments of theprocut side were more readily amenable to encapsulation in news stories Lack of enterprise is a more likely culprit than bias as there were certainly many aspects of the debate that went unexplored

Vale has argued that societal values areas crucialas scientific knowlshyedge indecidingenvironmental policy issues7 a view endorsed by Thomas et a)w Values arenothowever clearly distinct fromknowledge as people use the knowledge available to them in deciding what is valuable The framing of this environmental controversy (or any other) thus reflects a significant success or failure for one advocacy group or another

NOTES

Iacute Tony Atwater Michael Salwenand Ronald Anderson Media Agenda-Setting with Environmental Issues journalism Quarterly 62 (sumshymer 1985) 393-97 Kris MWilson Learning About Global Warming from Ihe Media (paper presented at the annualmeeting of AEJMC KansasCity MO 1993)

2 Michael)Robinson and AndrewKohutBelievabilityand thePress Public OpinionQuurlviii 52 (summer 1988)174-89

3 Christine R Ader A Longitudinal Study of Agenda Setting for the Issue ofEnvironmental Pollution (paper presentedat theannual meetingof AEJMC KansasCity MO 1993)

4 Ader JA Longitudinal Study Atwater Salwen and Anderson Media Agenda-Setting

5 Wilson LearningAbout 31 6 Thomas A Arcury Susan J Scollay and Timothy P Johnson Sex

Differences in Environmental Concern and Knowledge The Case of Add Rain Seacutet Jiotes 16 (May1987 463-72-

7 See for exampleJacob BendixandCarol M Liebler Environmental Degradation in Brazilian Amazonia Perspectives in US News Media Professional Geographer 43 (November 1991) 474-65 Lee Wilkins and Philip Patterson Risk Analysis and theConstructionof News journal ofCommushynication 37 (summer 1987) 80-92

8 Michael RGreenheacutergDavid B Sachsman Peter M Sandmanand KandiceLSalomons RiskDrama andGeography inCoverage ofEnvironshymentalRiskby NetworkTV journalismQuarterly 66 (summer1989) 267-76

9 Wilkins andPatterson Risk Analysis 10 Marilee LongJocelyn Steinke John Kalter Amy Schwaab Andrew

Savagian Na-ima Jaffer Jae Shim and Wayne Wenel Explanation in Newspaper Science Section News Articles (paper presented at the annual

B B

JPUgMUKW frMtiSCOMMOTtotliON QuAKIt-HY 62

meeting of AEJMC BostonMA 1991) 11 Bendix and Liebier Environmental Degradation 12 Marshel D Rossow and Sharon Dunwoody Inclusion of Useful

DetailinNewspaper Coverageofa High-LevelNuclear WasteSitingGontro-versy lournalism Quarterly 68 (spring 1991) 87-100

13 Dan Berkowitz and Douglas W Beach News Sources and News Context The Effect ol Routine News Conflict and Proximity Journalism Quarterly 70spring1993) 4-12Jane Delano BrownCarl RBybeeStanley T Weardon and Dulciacute e Murdoch Straughan Invisible Power Newspaper News Sources and the Limits of Diversity journalism Quarterly 64 spring 1987) 45-54Leon VSigalSourcesMake theNewsinReading the Nfiacuteosed Robert K Manoff andMichael Schudson (NYPantheon Books 1986)9-3

14 Harvey MolotchandMarilyn Lester News AsFurposiveBehavior On the Strategic Use ofRoutine Events Accidentsand ScandalsAmerican Sociological Review 39 February 1974) 101-12

15 BrownetalInvisiblePowerDCharles WhitneyMarilynFritzler StevenJones SharonMazzarellaand LanaRakow Sourceaacutend Geographic Bias in Network Television News 1982-1984 journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media 33 spring 1989) 159-74

16 Julia B CorbettHas EnvironmentalReporting Cone Global Covshyerage of Atmospheric Oone in Canadian and US Newspapers paper presented at theannual meetingofAEJMCKansas CityMO 1993)Michael R Greenberg Peter M Sandman David B Sachsman and Kandice L Salomone Network Television NewsCoverage of Environmental Risks Environment 31 (March1989)16-2040-44ConradSmithNewsSourcesand Power Elites in News Coverage of the Exxon Valdlz Oii Spill journalism Quarterly 70 (summer 1993) 393-403

17 Daniel RiffeBrenda EllisMomo KRogersRoger LVanOmmeren and Kieran A Woodman Gatekeeping and the Network News Mix journalism Quarterly 63 (slimmer 1986) 315-21Guido HStempel 111 Topic and Story Choice of Five Network Newscasts journalism Quarterly 65 (fall 1988) 750-52

18 Robert M En(man Framing Toward Clarification of a Fractured Paradigm journal of Communication 43 (autumn 1993) 51-58 Others have aso offereddefinitions of framingeg WRussell NeumanMarionRJust andAnnNCriglerCommon Knowledge News and theConstruction cfPolitical Meaning (Chicago University of Chicago Press1992) 60

19 Zhongdang Pan and Gerald M Kosicki Framing Analysis An Approach to News Discourse Political Communication 10 (January-March 1993) 55-75

20 Entman Framing 21 lonathan 1 Gange The Logic of Competing Information Campaigns

Conflict Over Old Grouth and the Spotted Owl Communication Monographs no 60 (Falls Church VASpeechCommunication Association 1993)239-57

22 The varyingdefinitions of old-growth forest are summarized inJack Ward ThomasEric DForsmanJoseph B Lint E Charles MeslowBarry R Noon and JaredVenier AConservation Strategyfor I he Northeriexcl Spotted Oioiexcl Report of the Interagency ScientificCommittee to Addressthe Conservation of theSpottedOwl(PortlandORUnitedStatesGovernment (tintingOffice 1990)

23 Andrew B Carey Scott P Horton and Brian L Bis-well Northern Spotted Owls Influence of Prey Base and Landscape CharacterEcologicalMonoshygraphsno62 (Tempe AZ fxologica] Societyof America1992)223-50 Eric

Faaacutefsntw Nrnv mn News Nrm Smjkceawgtthf Frami^bull bull wax Evvw wwestai CovntovEJLvy 63

D Forsmati K Charles Meslow and Howard M Wight Distribution and Biology of the Spotted Orol in Oregon Wildlife Monographsno 87(Washing-tonDCWildlifeSociety19S4)1-64RolandHLambersonRobert McKeivey Barry RNoon and CurtisVoss ADynamic Analysis of Northern Spotted Owl ViabilityinaFragmentedLandscape ConservatismBiology b (December 1992)935-12

24 William DietrichThe Final forest (NY Simon and Schuster1992) 25 Theseinclude Thomas etal4 ConservationStrategy andUS Departshy

ment of the Interior Determination of Critical Habitat for the Northern Spotted Owl Federal Register 57 no 10 (15 January 1992) 1796-1838

21gt DietrichThe Final Forest Alyson Pytte TimberSpotted Owl Intershyests Find MiddleGround Elusive Congressional Quarterly Weekly Report 4+i (September 1990) 3104-3108 Neil Sampson Lpdating the Old-Growth Wars American Forests (NovemberDecember 1990) 17-21

27 Thomas etalbdquoA Conservation StategyUS Department of Agriculture Forest Service and cooperating agencies Final Supplemental Environmental Impact Statementon Management ofHabitatfor Late-Successionaland Old-Growth Forest Related Species Within the Range of the Northern Spoiled Owl vols 1and 2 (1994) Frances C fames Joint ESAAIRS Review of President Clinton- Plan for theManagement of Forests in thePacific Northwest Bulletin of the Ecological Society of America 75 (June 1994) 69-75

28 Daniel AHagen James W Vincent and PatrickG Welle Benefits of PreservingOld-GrowthForests andthe SpottedOwlContemporary Policy Issues 10 (April 15192) 11-22 ClaireMontgomery and Gardner M Brown Jr Economies of Species Preservation the Spotted Owl Case Contemporary Policy Issues 10 (April 1992) 1-12

29 James DProctor TheOwl the ForestandtheTreesEeo-Ideological Conflict in the Pacific Northwest (PhD diss University of California Berkeley 1992)

30 Mark P Moore Constructing Irreconcilable Conflict the Function of Synecdoche in the Spotted Owl Controversy Communication Monographs no (it) (Falls Church VA Speech Communication Association 19M3) 258-74

31 See for example Mary H Cooper Jobs vs Environment CQ Researcher (May 1992) 411-18 Moore Constructing Irreconcilable Conflict James D ProctorEnvironmentalEthicsEco-ideologiesand thePossibility of MoralRealism (paperpresented at the annual meetingof the Association of American Geographers Atlanta GA1993)

32 Pan and KosickiFraming Analysis 33 In thediscussionofquantitativeresultsSources isused torepresent

source appearances forexampleone individualwho was interviewedin two stories would be counted as two sources

34 Leon V Sigal Reporters and Officials (Lexington MA DC Heath 1973) Brown et al Invisible Tower Whitney et al Source and Geoshygraphic Bias

35 Herbert J Gans Deciding Whats News (NY Random House 1979) 36 Proctor EnvironmentalEthics 37 Doris AGraber Processing the NewsHozo People Tame the Information

Tide 2d ed (White Plains NY Longman Inc1988) 38 Our examinationof visualsalso revealed that thenetworks tended to

use thesame stock footageacross the four-year time period While this isnot injierently problematic it was troubling when on at least one occasion the forest shown was recognizably located in the RockyMountains rather than the PacificNorthwest

JouxkalismampMasiacute

39 Resumes for threemembers of theselatter groups diet notprovide this information

40 For example when he was sourced David Wilcove was Senior Ecologist forThe WildernessSociety held aPhD fromPrincetonUniversity in biologyandhad authoredor iquestlaquoauthored twenty-six articleson conservashytionbiology Hewasfontedonly as TheWildernessSociety SimilarlyJack WardThomaswas fontedasBiologistUSForestService Thomas thelead author of the interagency report onconservation of the spotted owlheld a PhD in Forestry and had written more than 250 publications on wildlife biology The other expert source appearing in the story was fonted as Oregon Lands Coalition The latter source was indeed an officer of the Oregon Lands Coalitionand the qualificationlisted in that individualsbio include a high school diploma and descent from three generations of lumbermen Despite the apparently major differences in the expertise of these sources they were all fonted in a comparable manner- there was no way for an audience member to distinguish among their qualifications as NBC portrayed them as equally expert

41 Anna MGillis TheNew Forestry BiuSaejjtr 40 (September 1990) 558-63

42 See for example William BoothNew Thinking on Old Growth Science 244 (April1989) 141-43Frederick J Swanson andJerry T Franklin New Forestry Principles from Ecosystem Analysis of Pacific Northwest Forests Ecological Applications 2 (August 1992) 2iacutei2-74

43 For example wideiv published experts such as trie Forsman of the Forest Service Jerry Franklin of the Forest Service and the University of Washington and Charles Meslow of the Fish and Wildlife Service and Oregon State University

44 See for exampleHagenet alBenefits ofPreservingMontgomery and Brown Economics of Species Presenation

45 Peter Koch Wood Versus Nonwood Materials in USResidential Construction Some Energy-Related Global Implications Forest Products journal 42 (May 1992) 31-42

46 Dietrich The Final Forest Lange The Logic of Competing Information Campaigns MooreConstructingIrreconcilableConflict ProctorThe Owl the Forest

47 ThomasR ValeObjectivity Values and the Redwoods Landscape 19 (winter 1970) 30-33 Thomas R Vale Clearcut Logging Vegetahon Dvnamicsand HumanWisdomGeographical fceinew 78 (October1988)375-86

48 Thomas et al A Conservation Stalegy

itradeFt iwstsiw NrnvimNiiv News SiliketradeMS Fiwmimbull a an poundwilaquommeotuCtwntiWAW 65

Copyright of Journalism amp Mass Communication Quarterly is the property of Association for Education in Journalism amp Mass Communication and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holders express written permission However users may print download or email articles for individual use

meeting of AEJMC BostonMA 1991) 11 Bendix and Liebier Environmental Degradation 12 Marshel D Rossow and Sharon Dunwoody Inclusion of Useful

DetailinNewspaper Coverageofa High-LevelNuclear WasteSitingGontro-versy lournalism Quarterly 68 (spring 1991) 87-100

13 Dan Berkowitz and Douglas W Beach News Sources and News Context The Effect ol Routine News Conflict and Proximity Journalism Quarterly 70spring1993) 4-12Jane Delano BrownCarl RBybeeStanley T Weardon and Dulciacute e Murdoch Straughan Invisible Power Newspaper News Sources and the Limits of Diversity journalism Quarterly 64 spring 1987) 45-54Leon VSigalSourcesMake theNewsinReading the Nfiacuteosed Robert K Manoff andMichael Schudson (NYPantheon Books 1986)9-3

14 Harvey MolotchandMarilyn Lester News AsFurposiveBehavior On the Strategic Use ofRoutine Events Accidentsand ScandalsAmerican Sociological Review 39 February 1974) 101-12

15 BrownetalInvisiblePowerDCharles WhitneyMarilynFritzler StevenJones SharonMazzarellaand LanaRakow Sourceaacutend Geographic Bias in Network Television News 1982-1984 journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media 33 spring 1989) 159-74

16 Julia B CorbettHas EnvironmentalReporting Cone Global Covshyerage of Atmospheric Oone in Canadian and US Newspapers paper presented at theannual meetingofAEJMCKansas CityMO 1993)Michael R Greenberg Peter M Sandman David B Sachsman and Kandice L Salomone Network Television NewsCoverage of Environmental Risks Environment 31 (March1989)16-2040-44ConradSmithNewsSourcesand Power Elites in News Coverage of the Exxon Valdlz Oii Spill journalism Quarterly 70 (summer 1993) 393-403

17 Daniel RiffeBrenda EllisMomo KRogersRoger LVanOmmeren and Kieran A Woodman Gatekeeping and the Network News Mix journalism Quarterly 63 (slimmer 1986) 315-21Guido HStempel 111 Topic and Story Choice of Five Network Newscasts journalism Quarterly 65 (fall 1988) 750-52

18 Robert M En(man Framing Toward Clarification of a Fractured Paradigm journal of Communication 43 (autumn 1993) 51-58 Others have aso offereddefinitions of framingeg WRussell NeumanMarionRJust andAnnNCriglerCommon Knowledge News and theConstruction cfPolitical Meaning (Chicago University of Chicago Press1992) 60

19 Zhongdang Pan and Gerald M Kosicki Framing Analysis An Approach to News Discourse Political Communication 10 (January-March 1993) 55-75

20 Entman Framing 21 lonathan 1 Gange The Logic of Competing Information Campaigns

Conflict Over Old Grouth and the Spotted Owl Communication Monographs no 60 (Falls Church VASpeechCommunication Association 1993)239-57

22 The varyingdefinitions of old-growth forest are summarized inJack Ward ThomasEric DForsmanJoseph B Lint E Charles MeslowBarry R Noon and JaredVenier AConservation Strategyfor I he Northeriexcl Spotted Oioiexcl Report of the Interagency ScientificCommittee to Addressthe Conservation of theSpottedOwl(PortlandORUnitedStatesGovernment (tintingOffice 1990)

23 Andrew B Carey Scott P Horton and Brian L Bis-well Northern Spotted Owls Influence of Prey Base and Landscape CharacterEcologicalMonoshygraphsno62 (Tempe AZ fxologica] Societyof America1992)223-50 Eric

Faaacutefsntw Nrnv mn News Nrm Smjkceawgtthf Frami^bull bull wax Evvw wwestai CovntovEJLvy 63

D Forsmati K Charles Meslow and Howard M Wight Distribution and Biology of the Spotted Orol in Oregon Wildlife Monographsno 87(Washing-tonDCWildlifeSociety19S4)1-64RolandHLambersonRobert McKeivey Barry RNoon and CurtisVoss ADynamic Analysis of Northern Spotted Owl ViabilityinaFragmentedLandscape ConservatismBiology b (December 1992)935-12

24 William DietrichThe Final forest (NY Simon and Schuster1992) 25 Theseinclude Thomas etal4 ConservationStrategy andUS Departshy

ment of the Interior Determination of Critical Habitat for the Northern Spotted Owl Federal Register 57 no 10 (15 January 1992) 1796-1838

21gt DietrichThe Final Forest Alyson Pytte TimberSpotted Owl Intershyests Find MiddleGround Elusive Congressional Quarterly Weekly Report 4+i (September 1990) 3104-3108 Neil Sampson Lpdating the Old-Growth Wars American Forests (NovemberDecember 1990) 17-21

27 Thomas etalbdquoA Conservation StategyUS Department of Agriculture Forest Service and cooperating agencies Final Supplemental Environmental Impact Statementon Management ofHabitatfor Late-Successionaland Old-Growth Forest Related Species Within the Range of the Northern Spoiled Owl vols 1and 2 (1994) Frances C fames Joint ESAAIRS Review of President Clinton- Plan for theManagement of Forests in thePacific Northwest Bulletin of the Ecological Society of America 75 (June 1994) 69-75

28 Daniel AHagen James W Vincent and PatrickG Welle Benefits of PreservingOld-GrowthForests andthe SpottedOwlContemporary Policy Issues 10 (April 15192) 11-22 ClaireMontgomery and Gardner M Brown Jr Economies of Species Preservation the Spotted Owl Case Contemporary Policy Issues 10 (April 1992) 1-12

29 James DProctor TheOwl the ForestandtheTreesEeo-Ideological Conflict in the Pacific Northwest (PhD diss University of California Berkeley 1992)

30 Mark P Moore Constructing Irreconcilable Conflict the Function of Synecdoche in the Spotted Owl Controversy Communication Monographs no (it) (Falls Church VA Speech Communication Association 19M3) 258-74

31 See for example Mary H Cooper Jobs vs Environment CQ Researcher (May 1992) 411-18 Moore Constructing Irreconcilable Conflict James D ProctorEnvironmentalEthicsEco-ideologiesand thePossibility of MoralRealism (paperpresented at the annual meetingof the Association of American Geographers Atlanta GA1993)

32 Pan and KosickiFraming Analysis 33 In thediscussionofquantitativeresultsSources isused torepresent

source appearances forexampleone individualwho was interviewedin two stories would be counted as two sources

34 Leon V Sigal Reporters and Officials (Lexington MA DC Heath 1973) Brown et al Invisible Tower Whitney et al Source and Geoshygraphic Bias

35 Herbert J Gans Deciding Whats News (NY Random House 1979) 36 Proctor EnvironmentalEthics 37 Doris AGraber Processing the NewsHozo People Tame the Information

Tide 2d ed (White Plains NY Longman Inc1988) 38 Our examinationof visualsalso revealed that thenetworks tended to

use thesame stock footageacross the four-year time period While this isnot injierently problematic it was troubling when on at least one occasion the forest shown was recognizably located in the RockyMountains rather than the PacificNorthwest

JouxkalismampMasiacute

39 Resumes for threemembers of theselatter groups diet notprovide this information

40 For example when he was sourced David Wilcove was Senior Ecologist forThe WildernessSociety held aPhD fromPrincetonUniversity in biologyandhad authoredor iquestlaquoauthored twenty-six articleson conservashytionbiology Hewasfontedonly as TheWildernessSociety SimilarlyJack WardThomaswas fontedasBiologistUSForestService Thomas thelead author of the interagency report onconservation of the spotted owlheld a PhD in Forestry and had written more than 250 publications on wildlife biology The other expert source appearing in the story was fonted as Oregon Lands Coalition The latter source was indeed an officer of the Oregon Lands Coalitionand the qualificationlisted in that individualsbio include a high school diploma and descent from three generations of lumbermen Despite the apparently major differences in the expertise of these sources they were all fonted in a comparable manner- there was no way for an audience member to distinguish among their qualifications as NBC portrayed them as equally expert

41 Anna MGillis TheNew Forestry BiuSaejjtr 40 (September 1990) 558-63

42 See for example William BoothNew Thinking on Old Growth Science 244 (April1989) 141-43Frederick J Swanson andJerry T Franklin New Forestry Principles from Ecosystem Analysis of Pacific Northwest Forests Ecological Applications 2 (August 1992) 2iacutei2-74

43 For example wideiv published experts such as trie Forsman of the Forest Service Jerry Franklin of the Forest Service and the University of Washington and Charles Meslow of the Fish and Wildlife Service and Oregon State University

44 See for exampleHagenet alBenefits ofPreservingMontgomery and Brown Economics of Species Presenation

45 Peter Koch Wood Versus Nonwood Materials in USResidential Construction Some Energy-Related Global Implications Forest Products journal 42 (May 1992) 31-42

46 Dietrich The Final Forest Lange The Logic of Competing Information Campaigns MooreConstructingIrreconcilableConflict ProctorThe Owl the Forest

47 ThomasR ValeObjectivity Values and the Redwoods Landscape 19 (winter 1970) 30-33 Thomas R Vale Clearcut Logging Vegetahon Dvnamicsand HumanWisdomGeographical fceinew 78 (October1988)375-86

48 Thomas et al A Conservation Stalegy

itradeFt iwstsiw NrnvimNiiv News SiliketradeMS Fiwmimbull a an poundwilaquommeotuCtwntiWAW 65

Copyright of Journalism amp Mass Communication Quarterly is the property of Association for Education in Journalism amp Mass Communication and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holders express written permission However users may print download or email articles for individual use

D Forsmati K Charles Meslow and Howard M Wight Distribution and Biology of the Spotted Orol in Oregon Wildlife Monographsno 87(Washing-tonDCWildlifeSociety19S4)1-64RolandHLambersonRobert McKeivey Barry RNoon and CurtisVoss ADynamic Analysis of Northern Spotted Owl ViabilityinaFragmentedLandscape ConservatismBiology b (December 1992)935-12

24 William DietrichThe Final forest (NY Simon and Schuster1992) 25 Theseinclude Thomas etal4 ConservationStrategy andUS Departshy

ment of the Interior Determination of Critical Habitat for the Northern Spotted Owl Federal Register 57 no 10 (15 January 1992) 1796-1838

21gt DietrichThe Final Forest Alyson Pytte TimberSpotted Owl Intershyests Find MiddleGround Elusive Congressional Quarterly Weekly Report 4+i (September 1990) 3104-3108 Neil Sampson Lpdating the Old-Growth Wars American Forests (NovemberDecember 1990) 17-21

27 Thomas etalbdquoA Conservation StategyUS Department of Agriculture Forest Service and cooperating agencies Final Supplemental Environmental Impact Statementon Management ofHabitatfor Late-Successionaland Old-Growth Forest Related Species Within the Range of the Northern Spoiled Owl vols 1and 2 (1994) Frances C fames Joint ESAAIRS Review of President Clinton- Plan for theManagement of Forests in thePacific Northwest Bulletin of the Ecological Society of America 75 (June 1994) 69-75

28 Daniel AHagen James W Vincent and PatrickG Welle Benefits of PreservingOld-GrowthForests andthe SpottedOwlContemporary Policy Issues 10 (April 15192) 11-22 ClaireMontgomery and Gardner M Brown Jr Economies of Species Preservation the Spotted Owl Case Contemporary Policy Issues 10 (April 1992) 1-12

29 James DProctor TheOwl the ForestandtheTreesEeo-Ideological Conflict in the Pacific Northwest (PhD diss University of California Berkeley 1992)

30 Mark P Moore Constructing Irreconcilable Conflict the Function of Synecdoche in the Spotted Owl Controversy Communication Monographs no (it) (Falls Church VA Speech Communication Association 19M3) 258-74

31 See for example Mary H Cooper Jobs vs Environment CQ Researcher (May 1992) 411-18 Moore Constructing Irreconcilable Conflict James D ProctorEnvironmentalEthicsEco-ideologiesand thePossibility of MoralRealism (paperpresented at the annual meetingof the Association of American Geographers Atlanta GA1993)

32 Pan and KosickiFraming Analysis 33 In thediscussionofquantitativeresultsSources isused torepresent

source appearances forexampleone individualwho was interviewedin two stories would be counted as two sources

34 Leon V Sigal Reporters and Officials (Lexington MA DC Heath 1973) Brown et al Invisible Tower Whitney et al Source and Geoshygraphic Bias

35 Herbert J Gans Deciding Whats News (NY Random House 1979) 36 Proctor EnvironmentalEthics 37 Doris AGraber Processing the NewsHozo People Tame the Information

Tide 2d ed (White Plains NY Longman Inc1988) 38 Our examinationof visualsalso revealed that thenetworks tended to

use thesame stock footageacross the four-year time period While this isnot injierently problematic it was troubling when on at least one occasion the forest shown was recognizably located in the RockyMountains rather than the PacificNorthwest

JouxkalismampMasiacute

39 Resumes for threemembers of theselatter groups diet notprovide this information

40 For example when he was sourced David Wilcove was Senior Ecologist forThe WildernessSociety held aPhD fromPrincetonUniversity in biologyandhad authoredor iquestlaquoauthored twenty-six articleson conservashytionbiology Hewasfontedonly as TheWildernessSociety SimilarlyJack WardThomaswas fontedasBiologistUSForestService Thomas thelead author of the interagency report onconservation of the spotted owlheld a PhD in Forestry and had written more than 250 publications on wildlife biology The other expert source appearing in the story was fonted as Oregon Lands Coalition The latter source was indeed an officer of the Oregon Lands Coalitionand the qualificationlisted in that individualsbio include a high school diploma and descent from three generations of lumbermen Despite the apparently major differences in the expertise of these sources they were all fonted in a comparable manner- there was no way for an audience member to distinguish among their qualifications as NBC portrayed them as equally expert

41 Anna MGillis TheNew Forestry BiuSaejjtr 40 (September 1990) 558-63

42 See for example William BoothNew Thinking on Old Growth Science 244 (April1989) 141-43Frederick J Swanson andJerry T Franklin New Forestry Principles from Ecosystem Analysis of Pacific Northwest Forests Ecological Applications 2 (August 1992) 2iacutei2-74

43 For example wideiv published experts such as trie Forsman of the Forest Service Jerry Franklin of the Forest Service and the University of Washington and Charles Meslow of the Fish and Wildlife Service and Oregon State University

44 See for exampleHagenet alBenefits ofPreservingMontgomery and Brown Economics of Species Presenation

45 Peter Koch Wood Versus Nonwood Materials in USResidential Construction Some Energy-Related Global Implications Forest Products journal 42 (May 1992) 31-42

46 Dietrich The Final Forest Lange The Logic of Competing Information Campaigns MooreConstructingIrreconcilableConflict ProctorThe Owl the Forest

47 ThomasR ValeObjectivity Values and the Redwoods Landscape 19 (winter 1970) 30-33 Thomas R Vale Clearcut Logging Vegetahon Dvnamicsand HumanWisdomGeographical fceinew 78 (October1988)375-86

48 Thomas et al A Conservation Stalegy

itradeFt iwstsiw NrnvimNiiv News SiliketradeMS Fiwmimbull a an poundwilaquommeotuCtwntiWAW 65

Copyright of Journalism amp Mass Communication Quarterly is the property of Association for Education in Journalism amp Mass Communication and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holders express written permission However users may print download or email articles for individual use

39 Resumes for threemembers of theselatter groups diet notprovide this information

40 For example when he was sourced David Wilcove was Senior Ecologist forThe WildernessSociety held aPhD fromPrincetonUniversity in biologyandhad authoredor iquestlaquoauthored twenty-six articleson conservashytionbiology Hewasfontedonly as TheWildernessSociety SimilarlyJack WardThomaswas fontedasBiologistUSForestService Thomas thelead author of the interagency report onconservation of the spotted owlheld a PhD in Forestry and had written more than 250 publications on wildlife biology The other expert source appearing in the story was fonted as Oregon Lands Coalition The latter source was indeed an officer of the Oregon Lands Coalitionand the qualificationlisted in that individualsbio include a high school diploma and descent from three generations of lumbermen Despite the apparently major differences in the expertise of these sources they were all fonted in a comparable manner- there was no way for an audience member to distinguish among their qualifications as NBC portrayed them as equally expert

41 Anna MGillis TheNew Forestry BiuSaejjtr 40 (September 1990) 558-63

42 See for example William BoothNew Thinking on Old Growth Science 244 (April1989) 141-43Frederick J Swanson andJerry T Franklin New Forestry Principles from Ecosystem Analysis of Pacific Northwest Forests Ecological Applications 2 (August 1992) 2iacutei2-74

43 For example wideiv published experts such as trie Forsman of the Forest Service Jerry Franklin of the Forest Service and the University of Washington and Charles Meslow of the Fish and Wildlife Service and Oregon State University

44 See for exampleHagenet alBenefits ofPreservingMontgomery and Brown Economics of Species Presenation

45 Peter Koch Wood Versus Nonwood Materials in USResidential Construction Some Energy-Related Global Implications Forest Products journal 42 (May 1992) 31-42

46 Dietrich The Final Forest Lange The Logic of Competing Information Campaigns MooreConstructingIrreconcilableConflict ProctorThe Owl the Forest

47 ThomasR ValeObjectivity Values and the Redwoods Landscape 19 (winter 1970) 30-33 Thomas R Vale Clearcut Logging Vegetahon Dvnamicsand HumanWisdomGeographical fceinew 78 (October1988)375-86

48 Thomas et al A Conservation Stalegy

itradeFt iwstsiw NrnvimNiiv News SiliketradeMS Fiwmimbull a an poundwilaquommeotuCtwntiWAW 65

Copyright of Journalism amp Mass Communication Quarterly is the property of Association for Education in Journalism amp Mass Communication and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holders express written permission However users may print download or email articles for individual use

Copyright of Journalism amp Mass Communication Quarterly is the property of Association for Education in Journalism amp Mass Communication and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holders express written permission However users may print download or email articles for individual use