Suchergebnisse

The rise of right-wing populism in various countries poses difficult challenges to journalism: While populists themselves often accuse journalists of being biased against them or even of lying, critics allege that the mainstream media cover populism too extensively and normalize it. We reconstruct an understudied perspective on this problem: how journalists publicly discuss how to deal with right-wing populism. A qualitative analysis of metajournalistic discourses in the German press was conducted to identify typical narratives concerning the relationship between right-wing populism and the media, criticism of the way right-wing populism had been covered, and recommendations or demands concerning the "right" approach. Overall, the analysis reveals a rather uniform narrative about right-wing populism in Germany, and similar conceptions of how to deal with it were found. Most journalists make a clear distinction between the right and wrong way to cope with right-wing populism and emphasize the need for professional norms such as objectivity. Finally, we critically discuss some aspects that may inform metajournalistic reflection on how to cover right-wing populism, but that were absent from the debate.

Abstract
Previous studies have emphasized a person's biological sex as a factor which influences online search behavior. This study aims to investigate how people (N = 44 students) search online for political information (N = 220 search tasks) and if gendered online search exists. We examined online search behavior via eye tracking while the participants searched for information about political party positions on the Internet. A content analysis of the eye tracking data followed and was evaluated with a special focus on the role of biological sex and social gender, and the relationship of both factors with other variables, such as self-reported prior political knowledge, political interest, and Internet skills (via an online survey). The results accord with previous studies in that the sex influences the online search process. However, this relationship was partially mediated by self-reported political interest and prior knowledge. This outcome calls for a more critical use of the sex variable in reference to political online search behavior, and the inclusion of sex and gender related variables.

Civil and argumentative public discussions are considered crucial for functioning democracies. Among other factors, the quality of user discussions of political issues on news sites depends on prevalent discussion norms. We integrate injunctive and descriptive norms into news comment research, assuming that the degree of salience of the respective norm influences the commenting behavior. Furthermore, we discuss how technical affordances such as default comment sorting determine the comment visibility and thus the salience of norms. Using data from a content analysis of 8162 comments on eight German news sites, we investigate how the two norm types influence deliberative forms of commenting. The results show that different types of salient injunctive and descriptive norms promote norm-compliant commenting. Furthermore, the default comment sorting can determine which comments are more or less salient. The results underline the importance of distinguishing different norm types in analyzing the quality of user comments in comment sections.

Wie Menschen online nach politischen Informationen suchen, bestimmt entscheidend darüber, welche Informationen rezipiert werden und in der Konsequenz über das generierte Wissen. Das Suchverhalten in Bezug auf politische Informationen und der Einfluss verschiedener Personenmerkmale auf das resultierende Wissen ist jedoch weitgehend unerforscht. Diese Studie zielt darauf ab, mit einem multimethodischen Design zu untersuchen, wie Menschen (N = 44) online nach politischen Parteienpositionen suchen und welches Wissen sie generieren. Mit fünf Suchaufgaben pro Probandin und Proband (N = 220 Suchaufgaben) wurden das Such- und Auswahlverhalten mittels Eye-Tracking analysiert. Es folgte eine Inhaltsanalyse der Eye-Tracking-Daten und der Antworten zum generierten Wissen. Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass sich die Online-Suchen je nach Suchaufgabe nur in wenigen Aspekten unterscheiden. Das resultierende Wissen ist nicht für alle Suchaufgaben einheitlich und mitunter vom konkreten Suchverhalten abhängig.