Which factors are most important in explaining differences in role perceptions among television investigative journalists, ask Jesse Abdenour and Daniel Riffe, of UNC-Chapel Hill. The authors conducted survey on investigative reporters at local TV news stations in the United States.

The analysis revealed five functions describing investigative journalists’ perceived roles: adversarial, interpretive, entertainer, traditionalist, and mobilizer. Local television investigative reporters were more adversarial and placed greater value on audience appeal compared to other journalists, the authors claim. Investigative journalists at stations owned by publicly traded companies were significantly more likely to subscribe to traditional news values.

The article “The investigative DNA role conceptions of local television investigative journalists” was published by Electronic News. It can be found here.

Picture: Magnifying glass by Ivy Dawned, licence: CC BY-SA 2.0