| Center for Media Reseach as a data collector, I can say that unless you see the actual forms and criteria used for rating a news story on the "left-right" continuum, one can't really judge how "unbiased" the study is. In other words, a report about the report is biased in itself. I'd like to see the actual published study rather than taking one reporter's word for it.
I was a researcher on a Television Violence project back in the mid 1970's (it was an on-campus job for a starving student). Violence had an interesting definition in the context of the study: anything that happened to a human where a human was or could be injured was considered violence. This included getting shot or a pratfall on an "Archie" cartoon. Anything that happened to an animal was not considered violence. For every incidence of violence, we had to fill out an extensive form. The forms were used for subsequent statistical analysis. However, the results were completely dependent on the questions asked and whole areas (violence against animals) were ignored for the purposes of the study.
It is commendable that the UCLA study did not solicit outside funding that may bias results, but we know nothing about the agenda of the research team that designed the study, nor about their specific methodology; at least not from the brief article. I'm sure the full report of the study has such things, and for me to concur with the reporter's conclusions, I'd have to see that first. |
