ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the authors asked journalists in our survey to send a sample of what they considered their “best work,” on the assumption that such work might be more likely to reflect the roles and news values they considered most important than the more typical day-to-day news coverage. They were interested in the subjects covered, the roles suggested, the news values implied, and the kind of sources used in these stories. The best stories sent in 1992 are compared with those analyzed in 1982, using similar content categories. The 1992 study differed from the earlier one because the sample of stories included not only those from daily and weekly newspapers, but also those from magazines, radio, television, and wire services. However, appealing to the widest audience dropped considerably in percentage of journalists’ responses, and analyzing problems increased, again raising the question of whether what journalists said differed from what they did.
