CONTENT ANALYSIS

Communication and Language

• Communications have three major components:
• The message/text:
– Types of communication: Verbal, non-verbal or written
– Medium of communication: Face-to-face, via telephone,
television, radio, email, social media etc.
– News reporting, speech, interview, story, academic paper,
personal conversation, photo, VTR, poster, painting
– Language:
• Grammatical structure, errors, punctuation,
• Vocabulary: Words and phrases preferred, slang or formal v.
informal language.

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 Content Analysis
• A quantitative analysis involves counting
occurrences, whilst a qualitative analysis
places greater emphasis upon context and
meaning.
• The former is called content analysis, the
latter is called textual analysis.

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Some Sources for Content Analysis
• Newspapers,
• Political propaganda texts, leaflets, posters
• Political speeches,
• Party manifestos,
• Diplomatic Messages,
• Interviews
• VTR (Video Tape Recorder)

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 Types of Content Analysis
• Substantive content analysis: This is basically a systematic
literature search which involves identifying key words or
phrases.
• First, the search is only as good as the key words we use.
– Identify a set of key words related to your topic.
• E.g. Corruption, corrupt, bribe, bribery, buy off, match-fixing
– Identify a group of words which are all used to denote a similar
activity.
• E.g. Corrupt, dishonest, amoral
• Second, the search is only as good as the data base it covers.
– E.g. News related to corruption, Official documents on corruption
or speeches of state officials on corruption.

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• Key words or phrases we use are crucial to the
outcome of our research.
• Some phrases can become popular in ‘press-
speak’ for a specific period of time or for a
specific case/event.
• Some phrases can be used by left-wing parties
while right-wing political parties would prefer
another phrase.

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Content Analysis of News Coverage during
Election Campaigns

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 Types of Content Analysis_2
• A second way in which we can employ this research approach is
structural content analysis: ‘here we are less concerned with what is
said than with how it is said . . . We are less concerned with subtleties
of meaning than with styles of presentation’ (Mannheim and Rerich,
1995, pp. 192–193).
• Rath than counting the number of times a word or phrase appears we
instead concentrate upon the amount of space or time given to a
topic, substantive differences such as an accompanying photograph or
illustration, the size of a news headline, the page placement of a
story, or the type of reference (headline story, editorial or letter).
• The quantity of newspaper coverage in terms of the number of words
or the length of the story in column inches. Broadcast news stories
are usually measured in terms of time, that is, minutes and seconds.

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 How to do Content Analysis?
• Stages of Content Analysis:
– Sampling
– Coding
– Counting and Analysing

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 Sampling
• We must first define the population.
– E.g. Shall we look at all newspapers, all daily papers,
only papers with a circulation over a certain number,
papers in a single state, or only one particular paper?
• We must draw a sample within our population
depending on your topic.
– E.g. Look at the newspapers with a circulation over
100.000 per day.
• Find news on Syrian migrants published by those
newspapers between 2011-2017

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 Coding
• Second, we have to decide what to code and how to code
it.
• We can take two steps to ensure appropriate categories
are employed:
– (a) we can carry out a pilot study (we might find, for example,
the coding for positive and negative statements alone is not
very useful as all the statements are negative – this itself is
hardly enlightening);
– (b) we may employ a technique of inter-coder reliability in
which we ascertain whether the same texts hold the same
meaning for different people – the higher the degree of
consensus, the greater the confidence of reliability.
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 Problems of Content Analysis
• 1) Accessing documents:
– Documents provided for public consumption (for
example, newspapers and published texts) are not
problematic, but some formats (private diaries,
internal memoranda) are usually not easy to
access.
– Unless documents have been deposited in public
access libraries, it is always important to obtain
permission before making use of them in research.

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• 2) Sampling:
– Where exactly do we begin or end? As with all
other methods of political research, it is important
to define a study population.
• E.g. Is it feasible to analyse all newspaper coverage
related to Syrian Civil War?
• Should we include all news stories about Turkey
published in international newspapers if your research
topic is understanding international perception about
Turkey’s foreign policy?

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• 3) We should interpret the document in a way which
reflects its purpose. For example, for whom was the
document intended? Three types of document
– The first includes those internally generated by the
individual, organisation or government for internal
direction which reflect the decision making process.
– The second comprises those internally generated but
externally directed which might reflect or obscure the
decision making process.
– The third contains those externally generated and
internally directed (campaign propaganda).
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 An Example
• Conduct a content analysis on the news
coverage of Syrian migrants in Turkish the
news media outlets.
– Research Question:
– Population:
– Sample:
– Key words:
– Coding:

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• Research Question: How are Syrian migrants portrayed in
Turkish national news media? How often are news focusing
on Syrian migrants covered by Turkish news media?
• Population: News focusing on Syrian migrants
• Sample: National Newspapers or television news
broadcasts
• Key words: Syrian immigrants, refugees, asylum seekers,
displaced people, people fleeing from Syria etc.
• Coding: Positive or negative statements, the frequency of
news focusing on Syrian migrants, headline news about
Syrian migrants, problems of Syrian migrants or problems
they generate in Turkey
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 Cautionary Note
• If the theme "positive attitude toward Syrian
migrants," appears 50 times in one newspaper
and 25 times in another newspaper, this
would not be justification for the researchers
to claim that the first newspaper is twice as
positive towards Syrian migrants as the second
newspaper.

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 References
• Bruce L. Berg (2001), Qualitative Research Methods for the Social
Sciences, Boston: Allyn and Bacon.
• Lisa Harrison (2001), Political Research: An Introduction, London:
Routledge.
• David Howarth and Jacob Torfing (eds.) (2005), Discourse Theory in
European Politics: Identity, Policy and Governance, Basingstoke:
Palgrave Macmillan, pp.316-349.
• John Gerring (2007), Case Study Research: Principles and Practices,
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007, ch.2 and 3.
• Todd Landman (2008), Issues and Methods in Comparative Politics:
An Introduction, Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge, 3 rd Edition, ch.2.
• W. Lawrence Neuman (2014), Social Research Methods: Qualitative and
Quantitative Approaches, Essex, England: Pearson Education, 7th Edition.

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