Titles and brief summaries of selected journal articles of possible interest to the journalism community:Elaboration of the Hostile Media Phenomenon: The Roles of Involvement, Media Skepticism, Congruency of Perceived Media Influence, and Perceived Opinion Climate, by Jounghwa Choi. Hallym University; Myengja Yang, KT Corporation and Jeongheon JC Chang, Michigan State University. From: Communications Research, Vol. 36, No. 1, Feb. 2009

Hostile media perception (HMP) is a phenomenon showing the significance of individual factors in evaluation of media content. Extending theoretical understanding of HMP, this study has two purposes: (a) to examine the roles of different types of involvement in hostile media effect (HME), that is, value-relevant and outcome-relevant involvement, and (b) to explore relationships between HMP and other media-related perceptions, such as congruency of perceived media influence, media skepticism, and perceived opinion climate. Data were collected from college students in South Korea. Results suggest that value-relevant involvement, rather than outcome-relevant involvement, is a critical predictor of HMP in the context of news coverage of the National Security Law in Korea. HMP also was a significant predictor of congruency of presumed media influence, which in turn predicted perceived opinion climate.

Professionalism Online: How Malaysiakini Challenges Authoritarianism, by Janet Steele, George Washington University, Washington D.C. From: The International Journal of Press/Politics, Vol. 14, No. 1, Jan. 2009

This article focuses on the online news service Malaysiakini and describes the specific mechanisms by which it uses the ideology of independent journalism to challenge authoritarianism. It takes an ethnographic approach and analyzes how journalists at Malaysiakini conceive of “independent journalism” and how this understanding is related to broader questions of democracy and social change. Malaysian journalists are not only restricted by the law but also by structures of ownership in which mainstream news organizations are linked to the ruling Barisan Nasional coalition. Like Malaysia’s proliferating blogging community, Malaysiakini has taken advantage of an unlikely loophole in the law that promises a “no-censorship” policy for the Internet. Yet unlike Malaysia’s bloggers, Malaysiakini functions as a traditional news provider, and it is the norms and values of journalistic professionalism rather than the medium of the Internet that make Malaysiakini so threatening to government authorities. The author argues that Malaysiakini uses the norms of good journalism to legitimize alternative views of events, thus challenging the authoritarianism of the Barisan Nasional. She concludes by suggesting that in creating a space where citizens are free to express their opinions, Malaysiakini deliberately promotes a blueprint for democratic civic discourse in Malaysia.

, by Francis L.F. Lee, School of Journalism and Communication, Chinese University of Hong Kong and Joseph Chan, School of Journalism and Communication, Chinese University of Hong Kong, School of Journalism, Fudan University, China. From: The International Journal of Press/Politics, Vol. 14, No. 1, Jan. 2009

Media self-censorship refers to nonexternally compelled acts committed by media organizations aiming to avoid offending power holders such as the government, advertisers, and major business corporations. While self-censorship constitutes a major threat to press freedom in Hong Kong under China, recent studies have shown that Hong Kong journalists have maintained a strong sense of professionalism. The coexistence of professionalism and self-censorship poses important challenges to news organizations: How is self-censorship effected as professionalism does not favor its practice? How can news organizations minimize the conflicts between self-censorship and professionalism so that news operations will remain stable, smooth, and efficient? Drawing on the literature on newsroom social control, we tackle the above questions by focusing on the internal structure of and the interactive dynamics within newsrooms. Methodologically, this study draws on both representative survey and in-depth interview data. It is found that self-censorship is effected through selective positioning and assignment, observational learning of tacit rules, the giving of ambiguous orders, and the use of professional or technical reasons to justify questionable news decisions. Meanwhile, some journalists also developed their own operational tactics to resist what they perceived as self-censorship attempts. The theoretical implications of the findings are discussed.

, by Edgar Huang, Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis. From: Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies, Vol. 15, No. 1, Feb. 2009

Based on the uses and gratifications theory and the Delphi technique, this study did an in-depth investigation among 28 college and high school students on youths’ rationales behind their news consumption behavior. The study concludes that, in years to come, the news industry needs to realize a true convergence online by providing to the younger generation an experience of consuming multimedia news that is customizable and relevant to them with an opportunity for participatory journalism.

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