Texts as data II: media content analysis

This chapter discusses media content analysis, a method that applies quantitative and qualitative procedures to make inferences from text. Its main advantages are that it is unobtrusive, and that there is a plethora of media content available and accessible for research. The main challenge of the method is to develop a research design that promises valid inferences from text (meaning that ‘it captures what it sets out to capture’). Ignoring or not addressing such issues is the main reason for ethical concern. This chapter is based on the assumption that aside from more common methods like document analysis and interviews, media content analysis is also a valuable option for the study of media and communication policy. On the one hand, the method can grasp the public discourse about issues of media and communication policy. On the other hand, the data gathered by using this method offers much-needed evidence for policy-making. This chapter provides an overview on the steps of preparing and conducting a media content analysis, from the research design and sampling, to the process of coding, and the analysis of data. Two studies that employed media content analysis to investigate a topic relevant for media and communication policy are used as illustration. They have been selected because they clearly show the difference between the two main paradigmatic approaches to media content analysis: Von Pape, Trepte and Mothes’ (European Journal of Communication 32: 189–207, 2017) quantitative study follows the social science norm of being rigorously systematic, when exploring the discourse on privacy and new communication technology in Germany’s most popular and relevant newspapers and magazines. Young (Media International Australia 157: 79–90, 2015), in contrast, follows the humanities’ tradition of subjective interpretation, when examining the media policy reporting about the press council in Australia’s only national newspaper The Australian. Both approaches are valuable, and are ideally being used complementary, because they fill each others’ blind spots

New trends in Swedish educational research

  What new tendencies can be made out in Swedish educational research in the last three decades? Briefly, the following developments are described: In the 1970s, a long-prevailing emphasis on quantitative research was challenged by a number of different qualitative methods. Traditional sociology of education, meanwhile, was challenged by the new sociology of education. During the1980s, the dominant trend was a ‘‘didacticisation’’ of educational research, and here two main strands can be discerned, based in phenomenography and curriculum theory. Didactics very soon made its presence felt in educational policy, and in a major evaluation of Swedish educational research the two largely didactics-based traditions of ‘‘teaching and learning’’ and ‘‘curriculum theory’’ were identified as internationally the most significant. In the 1990s, educational research took a ‘‘linguistic turn’’—involving a wide-ranging shift in emphasis towards language and communication—with the result that new perspectives emerged. In addition, the philosophy of education experienced a powerful renaissance, partly as a reflection of the new focus on language and communication, but also in other respects, leading to a reawakening of interest in both classical and modern philosophy (of education).