Project title: A content analysis of the link between climate change and the UK
floods in media coverage
Proposed Start Date: 26/5/2014
Proposed End Date: 18/7/2014
Project description:
Your work on this project will look at how main UK broadcast and print media
covered the floods in the winter of 2013-2014. Taking as its vantage point the
scientific consensus that man-made climate change causes an increase in the
number of extreme weather events, the project seeks to answer the following
questions:
•
To what extent was coverage of the UK floods framed in terms of climate
change?
•
What source types were used in the coverage of the floods?
•
How did sources and journalists explain the causes of the floods?
You will carry out research through framing and content analysis of one week of
peak news coverage (identified through search on Nexis UK) across (a) six UK
national daily newspapers (The Telegraph and The Guardian, The Daily Mail, the
Daily Express, the Sun and the Mirror), and (b) the 10 p.m. broadcasts on ITV and
BBC.
The research will be closely supervised by the management team. Supervision will
include scheduled weekly project meetings with Prof Wahl-Jorgensen and Dr Berry,
as well as flexible meetings with the full management team as necessary. The
management team has extensive experience working with groups of researchers on
a series of funded projects.
You will benefit from the project by:
•
Learning how to construct and carry out framing and content analyses
•
Learning how to analyse content analysis data
•
Participating in academic journal article publications. Supervisors have a track
record of publishing with students at BA and MA levels
You will carry out the following work over the time span of the project:
May 26-June 6:

Conduct literature review on climate change and disaster coverage to
familiarise yourself with the conceptual framework for the project

Assist in developing, piloting and refining coding scheme for content analysis
of newspaper and broadcast news content
June 9-July 4:

Carry out content analysis of newspaper and broadcast sample
July 7-July 18
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
Enter content analysis data into SPSS database

Assist in analysis and interpretation of data
Selection criteria:
The successful candidate will have interest in carrying out research in journalism,
knowledge of key debates in journalism studies, and experience of content and/or
framing analysis.
Supervisors:
Professor Karin Wahl-Jorgensen – wahl-jorgensenk@cardiff.ac.uk
Dr Mike Berry - BerryM1@cardiff.ac.uk
Applications are invited. For further queries, feel free to e-mail Professor WahlJorgensen or Dr Berry.
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