Television news is under scrutiny in an innovative pilot study at Murdoch University.

Researchers from the School of Media Communications and Culture (MCC) have teamed up with ex-head of ABC News Mr Norm Taylor, to discover how much news is actually contained in a typical 30 minute program.

“We know news items compete with advertising, sport, weather and entertainment but this is the first comprehensive survey of the news attempted in Australia,” said Dr Gail Phillips, head of MCC.

“Until now, opportunistic marketing surveys have been the only form of news analysis available.”

The Murdoch team are working with Media Monitors during the pilot study, recording the key areas of news content across all channels for a month.

Dr Phillips said the project researchers are all highly experienced journalists themselves and will therefore be able to offer an insight into the sort of value judgements that might have been made behind the scenes.

“The content of a news item, along with its length, structure and place in the bulletin are all the result of editorial decision making and can reveal a lot about how the news producers view news,” she said.
The project, due for completion at the end of the year, aims to provide a template for qualitative news analysis.