Lasorsa Reese Source Use

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News Source Usein the Crash of 1987:A Study of Four National MediaBy Dominic L. Lasorsa and Stephen D. Reese

Employing content analysis, this study examines cover-age of the stock nriarket crash in 1987 for October andNovember by CBS Evening News, Newsweek. The Newyork Times, and Wa ll Street loumal. The news nftediapublished/presented 167 crash stories, citing 1022sources from business, government, academic life. WallStreet, lobbyists, and others. Sources differed, with thegovernm ent sources mentioning causes of the crash most of ten the n ationa l deb t while business and lob-byist sources focused more on effects. Print mediafavored Wall Street sources and used more sources Ingeneral w hile CBS favored government sources. Thisstudy finds, as hypothesized, that news media favor highprestige sources, and that use of different sourcesresulted in distinctly different slants. Public views of thecrash would have been shaped as much by the sourcescited as medium read/viewed.

^ The national news media in the United State s purport to workun der th e premise th at within a n ews story they present an objectiveaccount of news events, giving fair treatment to those with differingpositions. The press allows differing positions to be expr^sed byrepr esen tative spokepersons. Source attribution , the attributing ofpositions to individual persons, preferably with their relevantorganizational affiliations identified, is a fundamental practice of thepress. This attribu tion serve s important functions for th e audience. Itale rts the read er both to the ex pertise and the motives of the source.When critical readers "consider the source," they essentially makejud gm en ts abou t both the sourc e's capacity to offer evidence andmotivation in presenting it.Audience members, however, cannot judge sources they do nothear. Thus, in addition to choice of stories, news media wield enor-mous gatekeeping responsibility in their selection of sources, whichlargely determ ines th e way stories are framed. W e consider this selec-tion process an active one in two resp ects. Sources tak e an active partin promoting themselves into the news, and journalists actively


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News Source Ute in the Crash of 1987: A Study of Four National Media 61media differ in their source selection.^October 1987 crashIn this study, we focus on one major story, the Wall Street stockmarket crash in October 1987 and the debate over its causes and ef-fects, and we examine how four mjgor national news media theCBS Evening News, Newawedc, the New York Times and the WaUStreet Journal, used sources in their coverage of this story.We have several reasons for choosing this particular story. First, itwas an unexpected and largely ambiguous event, which resulted inmany differing interpretations and questions. The crash combinedtaxes, trade, interest rates, deficits and political leadership into adramatic national story.What caused the crash? What would be its effects?Second, it was a "big" story. The 1988 Media Guide called the crashthe "most important story of the year."^ The rapid plummet of stockprices on Oct. 19 was similar in magnitude, and instantly comparedto, the grea t crash of 1929. This major story evolved over a few weekstime and was covered by all major news media, thus allowing com-parisons across news channels. Metz provides a good in-depth look athow the business press covered the crash.'Third, we believe that studies of media content should go beyondbroad descriptions of news categories, such as "politics and govern-ment," "war and defense," and^ "economic activity," and focus onspecific issues and events in order to add to our understanding of thedynamics of media coverage as it evolves over time and in historicalcontext.We assume that news sources have different organizational affilia-tions that help indicate their position in the power structure. Thelarge majority of sources used in news stories are identified with par-ticiQar organizations. "Average citizens" without organizational af-filiations make their way into die news in times of personal triumph ortragedy (saving a child, dying in an accident) but they rarely appear inmajor news stories except as the "man in the st reet" reactor to newsevents.The second assumption is that from these affiliations derive dif-ferent primary missions. Organizations exist for different purposesand therefore have different agendas. For example, businesses,whether large corporations or small Mom and Pop outfits, have theprimary mission of making money for their owners. Governments,whether federal, sta te, or local, have the primary mission of providingprotection and providing services for their constituents. Academics,whether university- or institute-affiliated, have the primary missionof acquiring and disseminating knowledge. Lobbyists, whether for


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62 JOURNALISM QUARTER LYto th e relationship between sources and journ alists, describing it AB adance, with sources doing the leading more often than not.* Molotchand Lester share this source-centric view of news production, sug-gesting that powerful sources largely determine news by promoting"occurences" into "events."* Descriptions of news content concealthis underlying web of interests and sources if they do not identifywho is saying what.Who are the sources)Who are the sources for news? Most often they are govemment of-ficials and o the r elites th at is, the powerfiil. G ans notes thatalthough sources can potentially include anyone, "their recruitmentand their access to journalists reflect the hierarchies of nation andsociety."" He finds that network news and national newsmagazinesare dominated by the "knowns," over half of which are govemmentofficials. Sigal draw s a similar conclusion from his study of the NewYork Times and the Washington Post.^We know t h a t news is dom inated by official sources and other elites,and we assum e th at they a rticulate the ir own interes ts. We know lessabout what these sources say. Do sources respond in a predictahlemanner based on their affiliation? To what extent do media usesimilar sources? Do ma ss and elite new s station s differ in their use ofsources?One reason to examine source reliance is our concem th at it is a ma-jor factor behind the phenom enon of "media covergence," a tendencyfor all the med ia to focus on the same story at th e same time. Sevendfactors underlie this p rocess, including the herd m entality of tiiemainstream media as they look to each other for guidance." Powerfulsourc es rep res en t anoth er im portant infiuence: when national leadersspeak, they often are able to amplify their voices through the tenden-cy of the elite newspapers to cover them simultaneously.'This potential lack of diversity has intrigued scholars for decades.Several studies now have examined the extent to which the newsmed ia resemble each o the r in con tent. A t th e local level, for example,A tw ate r found subs tantial duplication in local new scasts,^" while thenational networks show especially strong similarities in news selec-ti o n ." T he prin t media have been frequently studied as well, compa^ing the mix of topics and content,'^ particularly as influenced by thewire se rv ice s." B ecker and W hitney confirmed this tendency for"g at ek ee p er s" to assemble a mix of stories in roughly the same pro-po rtion s tha t t he w ires make them available.^^ Newspapers appear toagree less on selection of specific stories.^'

The original agenda-setting study by McCombs and Shaw is one of


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News Source Use in theCrash of 1987: A Study ofFmr NationcU M edia 63the few to compare agendas across both prin t and national broadcastmedia, finding substantial agreement. More recently, Stempel'scomparison of the networks, prestige , local newspapers and USA To-day showed a similar pattern of agreement in the news "mix," therelative categorical proportions of news.^^ Lasorsa and Wanta alsofound substantial agreem ent in the agendas of four media, a local dai-ly newspaper, the New York Times, Newsweek, and ABC W


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64 JOURNALISM QUARTERLYthings. Because news sources have different organizational affiliations with different primary missions and perspectives, we expecthem to focus on different aspe cts of the crisis and literally see anrepor t different things.Evidence for the effect of psychological factors on perceptionabou nd , including the effect of m otivation ,'" prior experiences,"^ andattitudes." Furthermore, regardless of perceptual differences thamay exist among sources because of their organizationabackgrrounds, we know th at some sources desire to p ersuade and maydiliberately prom ote ce rtain im ages and im pressions over others. In-deed, this in some ca ses is the sou rce's job . The re sult will be, wehypotihesize, that different sources with different organizational af-filiations will:1) Differ in th e d egree to w hich they m ake sta tem en ts about causesand effects of the crisis; and2) Differ in the kinds of state m en ts they m ake about the causes andeffects of the crisis.MethodEvery story in the news sections of the New York Times and theWall Street Journal, and every story in Newsweek and on the CBSEv enin g N ews d uring the mon th of October and November 1987 wereexam ined for references to the stock m arket and Wall Street. To codeth e new scasts, ab stra cts of the CBS broadc asts were obtained fromthe V anderbilt Un iversity Television N ews Ind ex and Abstracts. Theseab str ac ts identify all sou rces used in a story . Television stories weredefined as one or more reports under the major imderlined storyhead ings listed in the Abstracts. All stor ies w hich m entioned the stockm ark et or W all S tree t w ere coded in the ir en tirety. This study, then,is based on a census, not a sample.In each s tory , all sources we re identified by the coder. Coders notedw ha t, if an yth ing , the source said abou t the causes and effects of thestock m ark et c rash. Ea ch source w as categorized according to his orher organizational affiliation. The seven broad organizational affilia-tions we used to categorize sources were:1) Business, someone who w as identified as represe nting , owning, orworking for a large corporation or a small business;2) GovemmejU, either federal, state, or local, including elected of-ficials, appo intees, an d spokespersons;3) Academic, someone rep res en ting e ithe r a unive rsity or policy in-stitute;4) W aU Street, without any more specific organizational citation;these include mostly bro kers, trad ers , and investors;5) Lobbyists, eithe r citizens or business;


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Nnot Source Use in the CroBh of 1987: A Study of Four National Media 65of the crash . Their response w as placed into one of 14 prede term inedbroad categories we thought responses might fall into, based onrecollection of coverage a t th e tim e. Resp onses actually fell into only13 of the 14 categories. No source mentioned the Federal ReserveSjrstem as a cause of the crash.' 'Each source also was examined for com m ents mad e about effects ofthe crash. As with the causes, mentions of effects were placed intoone of 14 broad categories we thought responses might fall into.Again, responses actually fell into only 13 of the 14 categories; nosource said the crash w ould affect mostly the wealtiiy.'^Using our predetermined categorization scheme, an independentcoder was used to code the data. A second coder was employed todouble-code 13% of the d ata . Inte rcoder reliability, a s m easu red byCronbach's Alpha, was found to be acceptable (.86 for the affiliationmeasure, .80 for the causes and .78 for the effects).ResultsIndividual stories varied widely in the number of unique sourcescited. In the 167 storie s analyzed, 1,022 sources were used, for a m eanof 6.1 sources per s tory. The m ost sources employed in one story was36. At the other extreme, 21 stories contained only one source. The1,022 sources were not evenly distributed across the four media. Asone might expect, the newspapers used more sources than did thebroadcasts. About 45% (465) of the total number of sources cited inthe four media appeared in the New York Times. See Table 1.

Table 1Frequency of Storiea and Sourcea, By MediumMediumTimes Journal New swee k CB S TotalTotal Stories 89 37 18 23 167Total Sources 465 257 189 111 1022Mean Sources per Story 5.3 6.9 10.5 4.8 6.1Maximum Sources per Story 36 22 31 15 36

Minimum Sources per Story 1 1 2 1 1Sources did no t speak m uch of causes. F ou r of five sources m ade nomention of causes of the crash, and only 2% of the sources quoted in astory cited more than one reason. The most commonly mentionedcause of the cra sh , cited by 21% of the sources, was the national debt,followed by computerized trading practices. See the last column ofTable 2.

** The 14 categories are: 1) the Trade DtfieU; 2) Interttt Ratm, 3) the NationalDtbt, 4) Computerized TradingPractictt; 5) Prttidential Policy; 6) the Federal Rtttrve Sj/ttemi 7) Partiian Polities, 8) a Siek Economy, with nomore specific cause mentioned; 9) theMarket wasOvervalued; 10) Unequal Wealth Lhttribution; 11) Wild Specula-tion; 12) Unetrtain Catuet; source says causes are uncertain or unknown; 13) Untptdfied CaMtef. source sa ys there


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66 JOURNALISM QUARTERLYSources talked considerably more about effects of the crash thanthey did causes. Four in 10 sources mentioned an effect of the c rash.Fifteen percent of the sources said the crash demonstrated the needfor partisan cooperation to deal with the crisis, another 13% of thsources said they still were uncertain whether the crash would havserious effects or not, and 10% said the crash disproportionately

would effect the health of small businesses. See the last column ofTable 3 .Did sources with certain organizational affiliations tend to citecauses only, effects only, both or neither? We found th at some sourcewith other organizational affiliations tended to mention effects bunot causes. None of the lobbyist sources, nearly all representingbusiness groups, * and only 8% of the business sources gave a causefor the crash, far less than any other groups. See the last row of Table2. However, these lobbyist and business sources cited effects con-siderably more than did any other groups, 71% and 68%, respectivelySee the last row of Table 3.On the other hand, sources tha t cited causes tended not to cite ef-fects. Thirty-one percent of the government sources and 28% of theforeign sources gave a cause for the crash, far more than any othergroups. See the last row of Table 2. However, foreign sources werethe least likely to cite crash effects, and less than half of the govern-ment sources cited an effect. See the last row of Table 3 .

N -CauseDeficitComputerTradeInterestUnspedficPolicyUnknownOvervaluPartisanEconomyInequitySpeculatnOtherTotal

Causes ofBiz81300250025001 300259

Govt.453 816774774700043 1

Table 2Crash Cited,Academic15

2000020720770130720

By SourceSourceWall St.85

152213129CM2721001317

and PercentForeign10

3005000100000001028

Unspec3 113167163130070032318

Tota19421161110765541111220

Note: Cell entries are percentages of the total number of causes cited by each sourcetype. (No lobbyist source cited a cause of the crash.) See Note 23 for an explanationof the cause l d l


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News Source Use in the Craah of 1987:A Study of Four NatimuU Media 67tain. A quarter of them cited reasons for the crash other than the 14we categorized.Spreading the bUmeGovernment sources heavily blamed the crash on the nationaldeficit and, to a lesser extent, computerized trading practices.Government sources spread some of the blame over many of the othercauses, as well, and only 4% cited reasons other than those wecategorized.Academic sources also cited a large number of reasons for the crashand they alone mentioned inequity in the distribution of wealth as acause. Sources identified only asfi*om"Wall Street" without anymore specific organizational affiliation heavily blamed computerizedtrading practices for the crash but they also spread the blame amonga large number of sources, especially the national debt, the tradedeficit and interest rates.Table 3 shows that the organizational affiliations of sources alsomakes a difference in what effects, if any, they cited. Many businesssources were not sure if the crash would have serious effects butmany said small businesses would suffer, and many others said realestate would suffer.

Table 3Effects of Crash Cited, by Source and PercentSourceBiz Govt Academic Wall St. Lobby F oreign Unspec TotalN -EffectPartisanCooperationUncertaintySmall BizHurtEconomicDecline

ConfidenceDownEconomicStricturesSpeedyStabilkationReal EstateHurtUnspecifiedNeed TaxesCrash Won'tSpreadSmall

612

25235802

162000

6840

62639706620

39131010

826

5000050

167111191084721112

50

40000

200

202000

0

825

00130

13000000

4815151515

44242222

396151310985542211


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68 JOURNALISM QUARTER LYinvestor confidence and a co nsequent decrea se in consum er spendingand a fair number also cited effects beyond those we categorized.Since these are census data, sampling error is not relevant and atest of the statistical significance of the differences across theaetables is inappropriate.'^Since sources with different organizational affiliations commentedon different aspects of th e crash (i.e., cau ses or effects), and made different comments about the causes and effects of the crash, the ques-tion emerges: Did different media rely on sources with differentorganizational affiliations? The answ er is " y e s ." A s Table 4 showBthe three print media relied heavily on sources whose organizationaaffiliation was given only as "Wall Street" (which included but werenot limited to brokers, traders, and investors). In contrast, the CBSEvening News, relied much less heavily on Wall Street sources andm ore heavily than the othe r m edia on governm ent sources. Newswedhow ever, a lso relied heavily on gove rnm ent sources, more so than didthe n ew spapers . Academic sources w ere used rarely in the broadcastsand most heavily by Newsweek. Foreign sources were used mostheavily by the network, which also used a large number of sourceswith organizational affiliations outside our categorization scheme.

N -SourcesBusinessGovernmentAcademicWall StreetLobbyForeignUnspecified

Table 4Source Affiliations, by Medinm

Times46 5999520417

Journal257713565117

MediumNewsweek189

92210382515

CBS11112232120744

and Percent

Total1,0229147481417

Note: Cell entries are the percentages of the total number of source types cited bythe media.Because sources with different organizational affiliations made dif-ferent com m ents about the c rash, and became the four media differedin the organizational affiliations of the sources they used, it followsth at the m essag es in the different media about the crash 's causes andeffects should differ. This, in fact, was the case.The m ost cited cause for th e crash in three of the m edia was the na-tional debt. For the Journal, how ever, t ha t w as one of the least citedcauses; the m ost cited cause in the Journal was computerized trading


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Neum Source Use in the Crash of 1987: A Study of Four National Media 69sources, it was presidential policy-making. The sources also differedconsiderably in the diversity of opinion expressed about the causes.The Evening New s sources made no mention of half of the ca uses ofthe crash. By contrast, the Tim^ made mention of all but three. SeeTable 5.

N -CauseDeficitComputerTradeInterestUnspedficPolicyOvervaluationUnknownPartisanEconomyInequitySpeculationOther CauseTotal

Mentions

Times92241571212

05470201247

of Causes Table 5of Crash, byMediumJournal47

62319134241300001324

Newsweek4022151383205003001321

Medium

CB S15470700130013207138

and Percent

Total194211611107

655411113100Note: Cell entries are the percentages of the total number of causes cited by sourcesin each medium. See Note 23 for an explanation of the labels.

A similar pattern emerges in the citation of crash effects. TheTimes and the Journal sources m ost often cited unc ertainty abo ut theeffects of the cra sh. Newsweek and the Eve ning N ews, however, citedpartisan cooperation most often as an effect. That was the second-most mentioned effect of the crash in the Times. The second most-cited effect in the Journal was a gen eral economic decline. Accordingto Newsweek sources, it would be economic strictures, and accordingto the E ven ing New s the crash w ould resu lt in a decline in public con-fidence and the suffering of small businesses (a tie). Ag ain, the diver-sity of opinions e x p r e s s ^ about the effects of the crash w as lowest onthe Evening News and highest in the Times. Sources on the Even ingNews made no mention of five possible effects of the crash ; the Timsmentioned them all. See Table 6.DiscussionSince sources with different organizational affiliations said dif-ferent things about the causes and effects of the crash, and since themedia varied in their use of these sources, it is reasonable to ask


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70 JOURNALISM QUA RTERLYTable 6Mentions of Effects of Crash, by Medium and Percent

N -EffectPartisanCooperationUncertainityEconomicDeclineConfidenceDownSmall BizHurtSpeedyStabilizationEconomicStricturesRealty HurtTax NeededUnspecifiedCrash Won'tSpreadSmallInvestor ShyOther EffectTotal

Times9215168

994352112

3046

Journal478

179777070150919

MediumNewsweek4018

411886

1731500

2420

CBS1524

9710100002300

3215

Total19415139885542211

25100Note: Cell entries are percentages of the total number of effects cited bys in eachmedium. See Note 24 for an explanation of the labels.the consequences of this reliance. Sources on C BS cited substantiallydifferent reasons for the crash than those in the print media. For ex-ample, the deficit was mentioned on CBS twice as much as in theother media, and CBS sources missed the computer angle entirely.The se da ta ap pea r to sup port the c harg e th at television news, relativeto t he p rin t m edia, pr es en ts superficial coverage using easily accessi-ble, routine sources.Th e notion then th at the national media are all alike in the messagesthey convey is contradicted here. The media give their audiences thesame "s tory" all the media extensively covered the crash butthat story differed significantly in sources used and therefore inemphasis."Diese findings point out important differences in both media au-dience and function. The Wall Street Journal first and foremostserves the financial community. The New York Times is thenewspaper of the national elite across institutional sectors. Networknewscasts and Newsweek appeal to a more mass audience. The elite


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News Source Use in theCrash of 1987: A Study of Four National Media 71preferred by the W ashing ton officialdom elite. All sec tors of the e literead the newsweekly magazines regularly. Network news viewingwas not examined. Although it has important consequences for theelite, TV new s probably does no t play a major role in elite opinion for-mation, but rather in reaction to breaking news events.Lasswell suggested that communication serves three importantsocietal functions: surveillance, correlation, and transmission of thesocial he rita ge ." The elite media may serve to co rrelate " th e p ar ts ofsociety in responding to th e en viron m ent," by allowing a con sensus tobe developed among intersecting elites for important national issues.This correlation fimction becomes particularly important in thesetimes of growing societal complexity, differentiation and specializa-tion.It is reasonable to expect that a consensus may develop in sector-specific media, such as the Wall Street Journal, then be picked upquickly in a trans-sectoral channel like the New York Times. In turn,tile newsmagazines and networks look to these elite media forguidance in their own cov erage. W e will explore this pro cess in futureanalysis by examining the evolution of the stock market story as itplayed itself out in both the elite and mass press. In particular, thisflow of influence may be made particularly app are nt by examining th esources that a re allowed to pres en t their views and frame issues in th enational media.

** Harold D. Lasswell, "The Structure and Function of Communicatxm in Society," in Wiltxir Schramm andDonald F. Roberts, eds., Tht Proceu aiuf Ejffectt of Mas* Communieation, (Urbana: University of Illinois Press,1971).


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