The News Quality Index: An Instrument for Assessing Local TV News

To assess the quality of local news programs, a News Quality Index was develped for a study that consisted of three parts: a content analysis of local television news, an audience analysis of the kinds of news stories that are most important, and an outside the market viewer analysis of the way in which anchors for news, sports, and weather are perceived. A recording was made during the week of May 24-28, 1982 of the half-hour, early evening newscasts of the three network affiliates in the Mobile, Alabama-Pensacola, Florida market. One videotape for each station, with three minutes of news anchor reporting followed by three minutes of sports anchor reporting and three minutes of weather reporting, were presented to 37 students from a vocational school and community college outside the Mobile-Pensacola viewing area. Results showed that only one measure, the average number of minutes of commercials, revealed significant differences across stations. Concerning the technical quality of the newscast, analysis showed that the station that scored highest in the rankings contained more techniques per video tape recordings, more slides and stills accompanying the news anchor reporting, and a greater amount of video accompanying the sports reporter. Audience preferences revealed almost no relationship or a negative one between audience ratings of the relative importance of different kinds of news stories and the station's attention to these stories. Four categories were ranked as important in determining news quality, in the following order: news substance, technical quality, the association between public preference for news stories and the amount of time stations devoted to them, and the ratings of news, sports, and weather anchors. (HOD)