ABSTRACT

Professional associations’ roles in shaping the journalism field have been understudied in news industry research. Adopting a social population ecology perspective, this study provides an across-time analysis of the emergence, rise and variation of the population of US journalism professional associations. In addition to the population demography, content analysis of current association websites was conducted to reveal associations’ patterns of development and adoption of roles. Findings suggest associations are turning inward, embracing roles that are internally oriented towards members, their financial struggles, and their identities, while there is less emphasis on externally oriented roles that serve field-wide needs.

摘要

专业协会在塑造新闻领域中的作用在新闻行业研究中得到了充分的研究。本研究采用社会人口生态学视角，对美国新闻专业协会人口的出现、上升和变化进行了跨时间分析。除人口统计外，还对当前协会网站进行了内容分析，以揭示协会的发展模式和角色采用。调查结果表明，协会正在转向内向，接受以内部为导向的成员、他们的财务斗争和他们的身份的角色，而较少强调服务于整个领域需求的外部导向角色。