Uses and perceptions of blogs: A report on professional journalists and journalism educators

Journalism and Mass Communication Educator

Volumn 62, Issue 3, 2007, Pages 305-322

  Chung, Deborah S ^a   Kim, Eunseong ^b   Trammell, Kaye D ^c   Porter, Lance V ^d  

^a UNIVERSITY OF KENTUCKY   (United States)

^b EASTERN ILLINOIS UNIVERSITY   (United States)

^c UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA   (United States)

^d LOUISIANA STATE UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 70350052413     PISSN: 10776958     EISSN: 21614326     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1177/107769580706200306     Document Type: Article

References (82)

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24. Lasica, “Blogs and Journalism Need Each Other.”
25. Blood, “Weblogs and Journalism: Do They Connect?”.
26. Regan, “Weblogs Threaten and Inform Traditional Journalism”.
27. Kramer, “Journos and Bloggers: Can Both Survive?”
28. Paul Andrews, “Is Blogging Journalism?” Nieman Reports 57 (3, 2003): 63-4.
29. Blood, “Weblogs and Journalism: Do They Connect?”.
30. Regan, “Weblogs Threaten and Inform Traditional Journalism.”
31. Wilson Lowrey and William Anderson, “The Journalist Behind the Curtain: Participatory Functions on the Internet and Their Impact on Perceptions of the Work of Journalism,” Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication 10 (3, 2005), article 13, http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol10/issue3/lowrey.html(25 March 2006).
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33. See Pew Internet 6 American Life Projects, Lenhart, Horrigan, and Fallows, “Content Creation Online”.
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35. Lowrey and Anderson, “The Journalist Behind the Curtain.”
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53. see William P. Cassidy, “Variations on a Theme: The Professional Role Conceptions of Print and Online Newspaper Journalists,” Journalism b Mass Communication Quarterly 82 [summer 2005): 264-80.
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56. As we were interested in journalists’ uses and attitudes of blogs, a phenomenon of the Internet, including online journalists was particularly important to this study. The member directory of the Online News Association, which has more than 600 professional journalists as the association’s members, thus, supplemented the list of traditional journalists accessed through Newslink.
57. Becker and his colleagues conduct annual reports on journalism and mass communication programs’ enrollment figures.
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59. The list from Becker et al.’s annual report better served our study purpose of exclusively sampling journalism educators than the directory of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication (AEJMC) that includes both faculty members and graduate students of jour-286-314. nalism and mass communication programs in the nation.
60. See Becker et al., “Enrollment Growth Rate Slows; Field’s Focus on Undergraduate Education at Odds with University Setting.”
61. Cassidy, “Variations on a Theme: The Professional Role Conceptions of Print and Online Newspaper Journalists’’.
62. Cassidy, “Online News Credibility: An Examination of the Perceptions of Newspaper Journalists”.
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75. For example, they were asked if it was a personal and/or professional blog. Respondents with personal blogs were asked if they ever discussed the journalism field on the blog.
76. Lance V. Porter and Lynne M. Sallot, “The Internet and Public Relations: Investigating Practitioners’ Roles and World Wide Web Use,” Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly 80 (autumn 2003): 603-22.
77. A principal components factor analysis was conducted using Varimax rotation. Items (blog use) that crossloaded on two or more factors and those with factor loadings lower than.50 were eliminated. The analysis yielded a reduced scale of 14 items that loaded on two factors, and, thus, one item was not included in the two factors. Both factors had eigenvalues of at least one, and the two factors accounted for 67% of the variance.
78. The blog credibility scale consists of two statements: “blogs are factual” and “blogs can be trusted” (Cronbach’s α =63). The blog quality scale also consists of two statements: “blogs are not poorly written” and “blogs are not done by amateurs” (Cronbach’s a =.77).
79. The blog efficiency scale consists of the following statements: “blogs help me sort through and analyze information quickly” and “blogs eliminate intermediaries, making it easier for me to reach my audience” (Cronbach’s α =.77).
80. The blog as threat scale consists of “blogs are not a threat to my news audiences” and “bloggers are not a threat to my industry” (Cronbach’s α =.77).
81. The blog role scale consists of five statements: “using blogs is now a standard journalistic tool,” “blogging activity will increase over the next five years,” “blogging should be taught to students learning to work in my industry,” “blogs are not a passing fad” and “blogs and bloggers are challenging conventional notions of my industry” (Cronbach’s α =.72).
82. The blog usefulness scale consists of six perception questions: “blogs provide a good supplement to traditional communication with my audiences,” “blogs are useful in crisis situations,” “blogs are useful tools through which to provide journalists with appropriate sources,” “blogs represent a personal way to communicate information,” “I do see the professional importance of blogs regarding my industry,” and “students are interested in learning about how to use blogs professionally” (Cronbach’s α =.80).