J-CurveA B C D E F G H I L M N O P R S T U VXYZWJJ
J-Curve One focus of communications research
has been the part played by personal contact in
the diff usion of information about news events
featured in the mass media. Th e assassination of
President Kennedy in 1963 and the speedy diff u-
sion of the news of the event gave an impetus to
this research.
The J-Curve arose from the conclusions of
Bradley S. Greenberg, and stems mainly from
work on the Kennedy assassination when Green-
berg investigated the fi rst sources of knowledge
about eighteen diff erent news events. It repre-
sents the relationship between the overall extent
of awareness people have of such an event and
the proportion of those learning of it through
interpersonal sources.
Greenberg argues that news events can be
divided into three groups as regards the manner
of their diff usion and the involvement of personal
contact in it. Type 1 events are important to the
few people who may be aff ected by them, but
are of little concern to the general public. Such
events, though reported in the media, will be
most generally diff used by personal contact – the
announcement of an engagement, for example.
Type 2 events such as those in typical main news
stories are generally regarded as important and
command the attention of a large number of
people.
News of such events is not likely to be passed
on as information through personal contact,
although they may be discussed, as it will be
taken for granted that most people will either
know of such news or that it is not of vital
interest to them. An example here might be an
earthquake in another country. Type 3 events are
dramatic, important and of very wide interest.
Such events, like the assassination of President
Kennedy, the death of Diana, Princess of Wales,
the destruction of New York’s World Trade
Centre by passenger planes hi-jacked by terror-
ists or the London bombings of 2005, get speedy
and all-enveloping coverage from the media.
Th ey also mobilize interpersonal sources, and
the proportion of those who learn of the events
from personal sources will be considerably
higher than for type 2 news items.
Such events are, however, rare and are usually
related to crisis situations. In the case of the
Kennedy assassination, Greenberg and Parker
found that the extent and speed of diff usion was
amazing: 99.85 per cent of the US population
knew of the event within fi ve hours of its occur-
rence. About 50 per cent of people fi rst heardInvolvement See yaros’ ‘pick’ model for
multimedia news, 2009.
Issue proponents groups or individuals, often
significant others, who promote, or help
determine, the ranking of an issue on the media
agenda. See agenda-setting.
Issues Th ose social, cultural, economic or politi-
cal concerns or ideas which are, at any given
time, considered important, and which are
the source of debate, controversy or conflict.
What is an issue for one social group may not
be considered such by another. Environmental
issues have arguably grown out of middle-class
concern, in particular among the younger, often
college-educated members of that class.
Of vital interest to the student of communi-
cations are such questions as: how are issues
disseminated? Why do some issues ‘make it’ to
the national forum of debate while others fall by
the wayside? What are the characteristics of a
‘successful’ issue? What prolongs an issue? What
factors, other than the resolution of the issue, are
involved in the decline in attention paid to an
issue? And, running through all these questions,
what role do the processes of communication
play in the defi nition, shaping and promoting of
issues?
The media are, of course, themselves an
issue, like all institutions wielding power and
influence, and the issues involving the role
of the media in society are meat and drink for
the student of communication. Th is has been
given due acknowledgment in communication
and media study syllabuses. Among the many
issues of current interest involving the media
are: censorship; media ownership and control,
including the role of conglomerates in world-
wide media activity; the part played by the media
in the reinforcement of the status quo in
society; in socialization; in their claim to act
as the so-called fourth estate; in policing
the boundaries of social and political dissent;
in being largely unquestioning advocates of
the capitalist consumer-orientated society.
Increasingly the issue dominating media debates
concerns the impact on traditional mass media
of the internet and the relationships between
them. See deviance amplification; effects
of the mass media; journalism: citizen
journalism; labelling process (and the
media); mainstreaming; mccombs and
shaw’s agenda-setting model of media
effects, 1976; media control; media impe-
rialism; news values. See also topic guide
under media issues & debates.
ITV (UK) See Independent Television (UK).