My post on “How to do content analysis: a step-by-step guide” remains the top post of Devcompage which speaks of the demand for communication research techniques like content analysis. I can understand that because most content analysis articles are either in books or journal articles which are on a pay-per-view arrangement. Last month, my students in an evaluation of communication materials class carried out their own content analysis projects and I’d like to feature one. Here are excerpts of their report.

Online reporting of the rice crisis
by Jovelyn Cristino and Renelle Joy Tabinas

Rice crisis. Rice is the most important food commodity in the Philippines; a shortage would mean hundreds of thousands of Filipinos going hungry. Several reasons came out on what really are the root causes of the rice crisis. Among those mentioned were the high cost of inputs, lack of forward planning, and the shift to corn and jatropha. Issues about the rice crisis as being artificial was likewise cited. It was said that the country was actually facing a rice distribution crisis and that the panic was being made up by the hoarders themselves who anticipate a rise in prices. To that, conflicts across as people demanded to be told frankly by the government that there is a shortage and should also be informed about the measures that the government and the private sector are taking to lessen the shortage. The rice crisis should be addressed and taken seriously by the government before the situation gets out of hand.

Online news. Information is probably the biggest advantage the Internet is offering. The Internet is considered as the virtual trove of information. It is the fastest moving in the world. There is a huge amount of information available on the internet for just about every subject known to man ranging from government law and services, technological information, fashion, food, news, the list is endless.

Online news websites are available in the internet. News can’t just be found in newspapers anymore.  The news is even more vital because online websites can cover all manner of topics and hence news stories vary greatly on subject matter. Take for example two of the most leading online news websites in the country: Inquirer.net and gmanews.TV. With just a click of the mouse, one can search the news he or she wants to gather, rice crisis for instance.

Objectives

1. Determine the contents of the sample issues in two online news sources
2. Determine the factors that contribute to the crisis
3. Analyze the frequency, placement, treatment and type of stories of each online sources

Methodology

Scope. The study dealt with rice crisis articles in the two online news sources: Inquirer.net and gmanews.TV. These sites were selected because they have the same circulation and reach and that the issues are regularly posted in each of the online sources.

The analysis focused on frequency of appearance, placement, treatment, type of stories, and content given to rice crisis articles in the site. The content was further categorized into specific areas: artificiality of the rice crisis issue, its causes, magnitude of problem, and the solutions.

Sampling procedure. All rice crisis articles posted within the time frame of one week, from March 25 to 31, 2008 were selected. It was at this time that the rice crisis issue was at its peak.

In GMANews.tv, two, three, four, two, one, one, and six articles were found on March 25-31, respectively, with a total of 19 issues.  On the other hand, Inq.net has a total of 24 articles – five for  March 25, four in March 26, two for the 27th  and 28th, one on March 29, four on March 30 and 6 articles  on March 31. A total of 43 sample issues for the two sites were chosen.

Results

Frequency of appearance. Of the 43 rice crisis-related articles in the sample issues within March 25-31, 2008, 44.4% were found in GMAnews.tv while 55.8% were posted in Inq.net. This indicates that Inquirer.net produced more rice crisis articles compared to GMAnews.tv within March 25 to 31, 2008.

Placement of rice crisis news stories. In GMANews.tv, the topmost portion of the page have clickable images and videos. The right side of the page is occupied by ads mostly on condominium units.  In Inquirer.net, it was the same with the GMAnews.tv but it has a banner at the topmost part of the page and has fewer ads.

Regarding the placement of rice crisis articles, 100% of the articles from GMAnews.tv were located in the breaking news category. This suggests that the website considered most of the rice crisis issues as important. For Inquirer.net, 41.7% were also situated in breaking news section, followed by headliners which was 20.8%. Articles in the editorial and infotech had the least percentage of rice crisis issues.

Placement of all rice crisis articles for GMAnews.tv was in breaking news because it is an online news source for television. Unlike Inquirer.net which is an online newspaper format, the articles were situated in the different locations of the site, either in headlines, column, editorial, opinion, infotech or letters to the editor.

Treatment. Both online news sources were neutral to the rice crisis issue which means that the site presented both sides of the story. GMANews.TV had 47.4% of their articles neutral while 62.5% of Inquirer.net stories were neutral. Only 15.8% and 16.7% of GMANews.TV and Inquirer.net, respectively, gave the rice crisis news a negative treatment.

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