Trends in science coverage: a content analysis of three US newspapers

Abstract

This paper describes a content analysis of science news reporting in three major daily newspapers, the New York Times, the Chicago Tribune, and the Washington Post, during the last three decades. It was found that although science articles represent only a small percentage of the total number of articles printed, this percentage has steadily increased with each time period. The results also show that, at least in the newspapers analysed, science coverage does not differ substantially in terms of the range of topics covered, as well as information that has been both included and omitted from science news accounts. Although there were some differences between articles appearing in the different time frames, in general science news reporting has not changed significantly in terms of the comprehensiveness of accounts. An especially significant finding is that articles frequently omitted methodological and contextual information, features most often mentioned as critical for a complete journalistic account of science.