Digital Commons Network^™

Podcasting The Primaries: A Comparison Of The Washington Post’S Print And Podcast Coverage Of The 2008 Presidential Primaries, Billy J. Roberts

Masters Theses

Podcasting has become something of a buzzword in several different circles from education to entertainment. It is being used as a way to disseminate lectures at major universities. Government officials are using it to broadcast messages to their citizens. It is also a new venue for independent artists and Internet users to generate publicity and to express themselves creatively. Yet, very little research on podcasting has been published.

This thesis explores podcasting, and the differences between the print edition of a national newspaper, The Washington Post, and two of its podcasts by asking: How does the political coverage of …

A Comparison Of Us And Korean Consumers: A Cross-Cultural Study Of Brand-Related Ugc Found In Discussion Boards Of Product Review Sites, Hyuk Jun Cheong

Masters Theses

This study is a partial replication of Fong and Burton’s 2008 study. Fong and Burton (2008) conducted a cross-cultural study comparing Chinese and US Internet users in terms of willingness to engage in information-seeking and information-giving, utilizing Hofstede’s (1980; 1991) individualistic/collectivistic cultural dimension.

The current study examines cross-cultural differences in the use of UGC between US and Korean consumers by conducting a content analysis of the discussion boards of six digital camera review sites based in the US and Korea. It content-analyzes 1871 online postings on discussion boards of US-based and Korea-based product review sites.

The study adopts Hofstede’s (1980; …

A Cross-Cultural Comparison Of Corporate Social Responsibility Practices: America And China, Christine Carol Ray

Masters Theses

This study examines the cross-cultural similarities and differences of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) practices between leading America companies and leading Chinese companies. It pays particular attention to the why, what, how and where of CSR practices and discovers how these companies manage and localize their efforts through the comparison of corporate websites. Utilizing corporate websites to perform a content analysis, fifty of the top American Fortune 500 businesses were analyzed. The results from the fifty American Fortune 500 companies were then compared to twenty-three top Chinese Fortune 50 companies. The codebook elements that were used to compare CSR practices between …

Love’S Gray Area: A Qualitative Analysis Of Interracial Relationships In Film, 1960s And 2000s, Jodi Lynn Rightler

Masters Theses

The purpose of this study was to explore the ways in which interracial relationships between African Americans (“blacks”) and European Americans (“whites”) came to be represented as “problematic” for mainstream audiences by conducting film analyses of the following four films; I Passed For White, Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, Monster’s Ball, and Save the Last Dance. The main idea behind this “problem” is the idea of border-crossing, or going from one racial boundary to the next, in terms of understanding one’s identity.

I systematically examined the portrayals of interracial relationships between “blacks” and “whites” within the US film …

Watching Satan’S Daughters: A Visual Analysis Of Lesbian Pulp Fiction Cover Art, 1950-1969, Carrie Shaver

Masters Theses

This research analyzes the historical social construction of identity through the visual reiteration of the norms of "woman" and "lesbian" as represented on the cover art of lesbian pulp fiction novels from 1950-1969. A subgenre of pulp paperbacks, lesbian pulps were sensationalistic and best-selling, reflecting the public lesbian image in the popular culture of the 1950s and 1960s (Keller, 2005). Their success in large part was due to popular mainstreaming of the fields of sexology, psychology, and psychiatry. The "normality" of female sexual behavior was a subject of great curiosity, especially after Alfred Kinsey's study of female sexuality was released …

Mobile Phone Communication Competence (Mpcc): Development And Validation Of A New Measure, Emil Bakke

Masters Theses

More than two billion people around the world have adopted mobile phones for communication. Interpersonal communication research has found that communication competence is an essential human need required to fulfill interpersonal objectives to achieve physical and psychological satisfaction (Spitzberg and Cupach, 1984), however, mobile phone communication competence has yet to be studied. The purpose of this study is to develop and validate a new scale designed to measure Mobile Phone Communication Competence (MPCC); a principal component factor analysis uncovered the structure and dimensionality of the MPCC measure. The results from the factor analysis in this study identified six constructs: asynchronous …

Organizational Culture And Change: Understanding The Western Herald's Newsroom Culture, Sarah Ling Wei Lee

Masters Theses

The purpose of this study is to explore organizational culture and change in a college newspaper's newsroom. Student journalists often use college newspapers as a means to get editorial experience and also to get published. Even so, the college newspaper newsroom is unlike a typical metropolitan or local community newspaper's newsroom in the way that it experiences change. College newspapers encounter organizational change as part of the newsroom's inner workings constantly because of frequent turnover and other factors. As a result, they are suitable for understanding how staff members make sense of newsroom culture in a dynamic, changing environment. Two …

To Watch Or Not To Watch? That Is The Question. Identifying The Common Characteristics Of The Reality Television Viewing Audience, Laura Sipple

Masters Theses

Reality television shows are increasingly appearing on network and cable outlets each sea¬son. Not only are they advancing in number, they are consistently dominating the weekly Nielsen’s Top 10 ratings as well. This study seeks to identify the reality television show viewing audience, why captivated their interest to begin watching these shows and what kept them watching week-to-week. By identifying participants who consistently watched these programs, it was believed that various themes would arise out of this study for further analysis and comparison. In-depth qualitative interviews were utilized to further explore the following areas: (1) Who are the consistent viewers …

Comparing Frames Of Cancer And Heart Disease In American News Magazines, Courtney L. Craig

Masters Theses

This study compares and contrasts the way cancer and heart disease were framed in three major American news magazines from 1991-1995 and from 2001-2005. It is a partial replica of a 1992 study by Juanne Clarke titled “Cancer, Heart Disease and AIDS: What Do the Media Tell Us About These Diseases?” Every article about cancer and heart disease from these news magazines in these time periods was analyzed and coded into categories. The study concludes that cancer is a much more personal issue than heart disease; it is portrayed in a way that makes it more “serious” than heart disease. …

Newspaper Coverage Of The South Korea-U.S. Free Trade Agreement: A Framing Analysis, Yeonah Park

Masters Theses

This study compared how four English-language newspapers in the United States and South Korea covered the Korea-U.S. Free Trade Agreement (KORUS FTA). A content analysis using QDA Miner was conducted for 354 articles from the New York Time, the Washington Post, the Korea Herald, and the Korea Times to determine how each paper framed the topic. Overall the newspapers’ media framing aligned with their national concerns and interests.

The literature review supported the idea that identifying frames in natural language articles and investigating the relative highlighting of issues was important in analyzing news coverage. The two Korean …

On-Air Weather Forecasters' Educational Backgrounds, Vincent Graham Walker

Masters Theses

Weather is important to local television newscasts, so it is becoming important to expand research regarding this area. It is important to understand why certain people are chosen to present the weather on-air. Currently, three different kinds of degrees seem to be the choice for the people who are presenting the weather on television. On-air weather forecasters who work for the local affiliated stations of ABC, CBS, FOX, and NBC networks tend to have degrees in meteorology, communications, or broadcast meteorology. Which one of these degree categories is preferred and why?

Two predictors come to the forefront to answer this …

Controversy In The Coalfields: Evaluation Of Media And Audience Frames In The Print Coverage Of Mountain Justice Summer, Amanda B. Womac

Masters Theses

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the media and audience frames used in print media coverage of Mountain Justice Summer and mountaintop removal. The study synthesizes aspects of framing theory of media effects as described by other media scholars in an attempt to create a working model to evaluate media and audience frames. As this study will show, the media use an overall negative frame in the coverage of Mountain Justice Summer, but also have an overall negative frame in the coverage of mountaintop removal. Based on these findings, the study suggest activists with Mountain Justice Summer helped …

Comparing The Quality Of Language Samples Obtained Under Three Sampling Conditions From Children With Hearing Impairment, Katie E. Stilwell

Masters Theses

Objective: To determine if there was an optimal language sampling context for children with hearing impairment; specifically, if any well-documented method of obtaining a language sample was superior to the others in describing the areas of language that are known to serve as a foundation for later literacy development.

Participants: Nine children with hearing impairment who used oral language as their primary mode of communication from the University of Tennessee Child Hearing Services clinic were selected to participate in the study. All were from Caucasian families who spoke English as their primary language and with the exception of hearing impairment, …

"You Go To War With The Army You Have‟, Not The Army You Might Want Or Need: A Case Study In Army Mediated Crisis Management, Charles M. Spears

Masters Theses

In December 2004, an enlisted soldier challenged the Secretary of Defense on international television and caused a media crisis situation in Kuwait and Washington D.C. that created a historic opportunity for military public affairs professionals to react to the press with electronic news gathering (ENG) technology. This case study examines how the Army responded from Kuwait and subjects these events to models of response generated by Coombs (1995) and Hale et al (2005). The intent is to examine the media crisis response strategies employed by the Coalition Forces Land Component Command (CFLCC) and to compare them with strategies that have …

Watch Out For The Freshman 15: An Investigation And Interpretation Of Memorable Health Messages Received By College Students, Lindsey Marie Rose

Masters Theses

Using the memorable messages framework as a guide (Knapp, Stohl & Reardon, 1981), this thesis examines the memorable health messages that college students are able to recall. The survey design queried respondents about the structure and form of the message, circumstances surrounding the message, the source of the message, and the content of the message. The data was assessed quantitatively through use of one-sample chi-square tests, and qualitatively utilizing grounded theory. The results of the study were generally supported by previous memorable message studies. The research findings are discussed based on the memorable messages framework and the implications for future …

Stepping Outside The Sacred Circle: Narratives Of Violence And Disempowerment Of The Contemporary Indian Woman, Koeli M. Goel

Masters Theses

No abstract provided.

The Making Of A Middlerace: The Social Politics Surrounding Black-White Interracial Marriages And Black White Biracial Identity, Yoftahe K. Manna

Masters Theses

No abstract provided.

Discussing The Argumentativeness Scale, Jacob A. Sweet

Masters Theses

No abstract provided.

Collectively We Unite On Facebook: A Case Study Of Egypt's Collective Action On Facebook Toward Social Change, Basma Botros

Masters Theses

No abstract provided.