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Browsing Theses & Dissertations by Author "Abdenour, Jesse"

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    An examination of the coverage of Oregon22
    (University of Oregon, 2023) Heisen, Aaron; Shontz, Lori; Jacobsen, Trond; Abdenour, Jesse
    The World Athletics Championships Oregon22 marked the first World Championships held in the United States. Track and field officials hoped this event would help increase the support of track and field in the United States. These officials created marketing plans and expected American media covering Oregon22 to frontline this growth movement. This researcher set out to explore the coverage of Oregon22 to test if the coverage provided by American publications was equal for female and male athletes. Oregon22 was an “equal-participation event1” that had 24 events featuring female athletes and 24 events featuring male athletes. This researcher conducted an intensive descriptive analysis of 17 articles published by four prominent American publications — The New York Times, ESPN, NBC Sports, and The Los Angeles Times — as well as 11 articles published by the governing body’s website, World Athletics. The researcher chose to examine events featuring top American athletes, so that included the 100 meters, 400-meter hurdles, shot put, javelin, and pole vault. The researcher also set out to test if these four major U.S. publications and World Athletics employed a similar number of female and male journalists at Oregon22. In addition to examining the gender equity of the competitors and journalists at Oregon22, this researcher wanted to see if Oregon22 did help to increase the support of track and field in the United States. These findings could help to indicate that the quantity of coverage of female and male athletes on these four major American publications and World Athletics was equal. This research also found that American publications did not employ an equal number of female journalists, although World Athletics did. However, each of these findings are far from concrete as the researcher struggled to find articles covering these five events on the four major American publications. The researcher also found articles published by The Los Angeles Times and The New York Times discussing that lack of coverage of Oregon22, as well as track and field officials’ dismay with the support of casual sports fans. These findings led the researcher to believe that Oregon22 might not have increased the following of track and field in the United States.
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    ItemOpen Access
    Harassing the Fourth Estate: The Prevalence and Effects of Outsider-Initiated Harassment Towards Journalists
    (University of Oregon, 2020-09-24) Miller, Kaitlin; Abdenour, Jesse
    Harassment of journalists from viewers, readers, and strangers is not a new phenomenon, but one that is increasingly garnering attention by both the popular press and trade press. As such, this paper utilizes theoretical concepts of sensemaking, emotional labor, and affective events theory to analyze and interpret what type of harassment events (negative affective events) journalists experience, their emotional responses (affective reactions), and their subsequent actions (affective behaviors) and satisfaction with journalistic work (work attitudes). Research indicated journalists experience three primary forms of harassment at work: (1) incivility and disruptive harassment, (2) sexual harassment, and (3) personally attacking harassment. Women, more visible journalists such as broadcast journalists, and some journalists of color are more likely than other journalists to experience harassment from viewers, readers, and strangers. When examining affective reactions, men—who noted limited to no experience with sexual harassment—say they experience emotions of anger when harassed. Women, however, noted emotions of anger when experiencing sexual harassment, and emotions of fear when experiencing incivility and disruptive harassment and personally attacking harassment. Journalists’ emotions, gender, and the frequency at which they experience harassment were predictors of affect-driven work behaviors such as avoiding interviewing someone, being less active on social media, and even considering leaving journalism. Younger journalists were also more likely to engage in affect-driven work behaviors. Harassment also affected journalists’ work attitude of job satisfaction—specifically incivility and disruptive harassment. This type of harassment is likely to decrease job satisfaction while supervisor support and larger organizational size are likely to increase satisfaction. In sum, harassment from viewers, readers, and strangers not only affects journalists’ emotions, it affects how they act and think about their work. This research adds to literature on Affective Events Theory by highlighting work harassment from organizational outsiders (readers viewers, and strangers) as an affective event with significant affect-driven behaviors and attitudes. Furthermore, there are practical implications for practitioners discussed at the end of this paper—highlighting the need for supervisor support, empowerment, and education of journalists.