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THE CREDIBILITY OF MEDIA COVERAGE OF THE REFERENDUM ON MARRIAGE (CASE STUDY OF DAILIES AND MAGAZINES VECERNJI LIST, JUTARNJI LIST, NOVI LIST, SLOBODNA DALMACIJA, GLAS KONCILA, GLOBUS, HRVATSKO SLOVO, 7 DNEVNO, GLAS PODRAVINE)
Ksenija ŽLOF
; Croatia Airlines, Zagreb
Franjo MALETIĆ
; Sveučilište Sjever, Koprivnica
Slobodan HADŽIĆ
; Presscut, Varaždin
Sažetak
The credibility of the newspaper reporting is experiencing a re-actualization in theoretical and practical segment, due to the media explosion, the general crisis of the media industry, resulting in reduced production costs at the expense of the quality of news reporting and the present, apparently paradoxical, process of implosion of information. Broader recent theoretical paradigm journalistic provenance, to which the authors refer - and that includes the method of construction of media content, theory and past news value - partly answers the current theoretical problem of credibility. A broader recent theoretical paradigm of journalistic provenance, to which the authors refer - and that includes the method of construction of media content, the gatekeepers’ theory and past news value – in part answers the current theoretical problem of credibility. The authors start from the existing theoretical postulates, questioning the credibility of reporting, taking as an example a relevant event - a Croatian referendum on marriage – where the Croatian media and the general public were deeply divided, handing the authors a good example of testing the credibility of media coverage. The credibility of the media is associated with the professionalism of their journalists, where professionalism is based on respect for the professional standards of reporting. The aim of this study was to investigate whether journalists respected professional standards of reporting, which is the basic prerequisite for the credibility of media reports, and how credible were media reports on the subject of the Referendum on marriage. Assuming that the media faithfully reported on the Referendum on marriage, the authors conducted a study on a selected sample - in four Croatian daily newspapers (Vecernji List, Jutarnji list, Novi list, Slobodna Dalmacija) and four weeklies (Globus, Glas Koncila, Hrvatsko slovo, 7 Dnevno). The study included Glas Podravine with the sole intention of checking whether the corps of future research should include regional newspapers. The credibility of media reports was investigated and measured using the credibility scale with credibility elements with embedded professional standards of reporting: truthfulness, fairness, balance, accuracy, impartiality, timeliness, and at least two named sources, which also represent our categories for content analysis. Research results confirmed the correctness of the chosen topic in the intensity of reporting, but also observed open, biased taking sides in some media, as well as violation of professional standards of reporting. The scale of credibility underwent methodological checks, in itself synthesizing all the relevant elements of the media reports (on the example of news and reports), and thus, is recommended as a research tool. It is recommended that future research testing of weighting the importance of certain elements of the scale with the characteristics of the recipients, under the assumption that the characteristics of the recipients have an impact on the perception of the professional standards of media reports as an element of credibility. The research results of the first phase of work show the necessity of constant questioning of professional standards, reporting and implementation of applied instruments in professional reporting.
Ključne riječi
credibility; a referendum on marriage; professional standards of reporting; design of media content
Hrčak ID:
131429
URI
Datum izdavanja:
22.12.2014.
Posjeta: 3.402 *