How youth and children's issues are represented in the media : content analysis on newspaper articles
Liira, Taru (2012)
Liira, Taru
Humanistinen ammattikorkeakoulu
2012
All rights reserved
Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:amk-2012091813709
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:amk-2012091813709
Tiivistelmä
The purpose of this research was to study how children’s and young peoples issues are represented in the Finnish media in connection to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of a Child. The convention is an international agreement, which was ratified by Finland in 1991. The Convention con-sists of 54 Articles and three Parts. These articles portray children’s rights in different areas of their lives.
The research method used was the qualitative content analysis. Content analysis is commonly used tool to study different fields of media and the messages, texts and pictures produced by the media. The material is collected from one newspaper during three 10-day periods. There were all together 182 newspaper articles, which were analyzed. The newspaper articles are then divided into different categories and analyzed. The nine categories in the analysis are: crime and criminal acts, culture, daycare, early years, education, family and parenting, health related issues, social issues and youth issues. The articles were further analyzed on their content concerning who wrote them, in which part of the newspaper they were published and whether they portrayed children and young people as sub-jects or objects. The photos in connection to the articles were not analyzed.
The top three categories on the child and youth related articles were: youth issues, education and family & parenting. There were most articles in the opinion page section and domestic section of the newspaper. The Youth Mail section had 28 articles during the 30 days, when the articles were col-lected. There were no articles, which were written by younger children nor aimed for this age group.
There was only one article in which the Convention on the Rights of a Child was mentioned, even though the time period for the article collection took place around the time of the International day of the Convention.
Recommendation for the future is that both the children’s and young people’s issues as well as the UNCRC will get more media attention. Also special children’s pages in Helsingin Sanomat should be developed to enable children to use written media. These pages should be published on regular basis.
The research method used was the qualitative content analysis. Content analysis is commonly used tool to study different fields of media and the messages, texts and pictures produced by the media. The material is collected from one newspaper during three 10-day periods. There were all together 182 newspaper articles, which were analyzed. The newspaper articles are then divided into different categories and analyzed. The nine categories in the analysis are: crime and criminal acts, culture, daycare, early years, education, family and parenting, health related issues, social issues and youth issues. The articles were further analyzed on their content concerning who wrote them, in which part of the newspaper they were published and whether they portrayed children and young people as sub-jects or objects. The photos in connection to the articles were not analyzed.
The top three categories on the child and youth related articles were: youth issues, education and family & parenting. There were most articles in the opinion page section and domestic section of the newspaper. The Youth Mail section had 28 articles during the 30 days, when the articles were col-lected. There were no articles, which were written by younger children nor aimed for this age group.
There was only one article in which the Convention on the Rights of a Child was mentioned, even though the time period for the article collection took place around the time of the International day of the Convention.
Recommendation for the future is that both the children’s and young people’s issues as well as the UNCRC will get more media attention. Also special children’s pages in Helsingin Sanomat should be developed to enable children to use written media. These pages should be published on regular basis.