Selecting and Presenting News

Selecting and Presenting News

IGCSE Sociology

Lesson objectives

• explain the selection and presentation of news, including agenda setting, gate-keeping and stereotyping​

IGCSE Sociology

• Most people access at least one source of news information a day.

• What counts as news and how the contents of the news are shaped by social factors are some of the concerns taken by Sociologists.​

"news​" events are happening all the time but our news reports only include those that are selected by journalists, editors, and media owners.

Events take place

The event is shaped by journalists whose accounts. will be influenced by social and cultural factors, such as the age, class, gender, religion, or ethnicity of the journalist.

Telling the story

"Structural" elements, such as the size of the news company or the cost of covering a story will also affect the choice of stories transmitted.

Outside factors

The final story is the product of several processes, all of which have shaped what we read or see in the news.

NEWS report

NEWS is a social construction.

Results of decisions and choices made by journalist and other, which in a way does not reflect complete reality.

• Sociologists show that social construction of news has two stages: selection and presentation.

refers to how some events become news and others do not. (news values - the ideas that people working in the news industries have about what makes a good news stories)

SELECTION

decision made about how news stories will appear to the reader or viewer (what angle, spin or interpretation is put on the story.

PRESENTATION

Gatekeepers such as news editors decide what to select and what to discard as news.

• editors receive many stories and have to decide whether to include them; some pass and some don't; such practice forms agenda setting (selecting what is important.

Selection of news

Sometimes based on practical and cultural constraints

Practical: time and space

​

News bulletins and newspapers normally have a set amount of space to fill: say half an hour or 48 pages.​

In ​newspapers, there are home news, foreign news, business news, sports news and so on. There's limited space but they need to fill each page.

Selection of news

Sometimes based on practical and cultural constraints

Cultural: how news is shaped by values and ideas that make a story newsworthy.

​

Marxists and others say that reporters share professional ideology as they had professional training. ​

​

​

Newsworthiness: the extent to which a news story conforms to news values.

Marxists' criticisms on news media

• selecting and presenting news stories in ways that suit powerful groups in society

• neglecting the interest and concerns of particular gouprs in society

• neglecting the wrongdoing of large and powerful corporations​

WIDELY agreed news values

news values

bad news is preferred to good news

2. negativity

the media report events that fit in with their schedules; long-term trends receive less coverage

1. frequency

news values

human interest to the story; promotion of empathy

4. Personalisation

events that are out of the ordinary

3. unexpectedness

news values

stories about royalty, leading politicians and celebrities can be news stories when they would not be if only ordinary people were involved

6. reference to elite individuals

news about the US and other wealthy countries has higher news value than other countries

5. Reference to elite nations

news values

being able to get a reporter or a film crew to the place where an event has happened

8. logistics

stories that can be made dramatic because they involve a clash of ideas or people

7. conflict

news values

events whose meaning is clear are more newsworthy than those where there is doubt and uncertainty

10. lack of ambiguity

when the story has more meaning to the audience because they can identify with aspects of it

9. meaningfulness

news values

once established, a story may run for a long time and minor new developments may be given prominence

11. continuity

Graded ACTIVITY (individual)

Open the link posted on MS Teams: ​https://forms.office.com/Pages/ResponsePage.aspx?id=8D0APsC04kuSPOtePRSiHRU28ohZB19MhpSoS5sFxIlUMklIMllUSk41WjlDSTM4R1lMNTk0VFA2Uy4u