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Bilateral relations between countries and the complexity of newspaper editorials

All cards were then scored independently on a scale of -3 to +3 by five research assistants who were uninformed about the topic of this particular study. The raters were instructed to assign negative numbers when in their judgment the Table II. Scorable "Country/Years"a Subject Source Canada USSR China USA Total Canada -14 9 27 50 U.S.S.R. 4 - 13 16 33 U.S.A. 13 27 10 -50 Total 17 41 32 43 133 a Number of years for which both relevant editorials and valenced events were available. 606

Bilateral Relations Between Countries and the Complexity of Newspaper Editorials Table III. Positive and Negative Events: Examples Score Year Countries Event Positive +2.6 1970 Canada-P.R.C. Diplomatic ties established. +2.4 1981 U.S.A.-U.S.S.R. Trade increases nearly 50% over previous year Neutral +0.4 1978 U.S.A.-Canada U.S. considering natural-gas pipeline through Canada; mixed economic results anticipated for Canada. 0.0 1971 U.S.A.-P.R.C. U.S. president says forthcoming visit to the U.S.S.R. has no connection with visit to P.R.C. Negative -2.4 1980 U.S.A.-U.S.S.R. U.S. boycott of Moscow Olympic Games. -2.8 1960 U.S.S.R.-U.S.A. Soviets shoot down U.S. aircraft over Bering Sea event was characterized by or led to international tension, hostility, conflict, strained or reduced interactions, etc.; and positive numbers when the event reflected or led to friendship, friendly trade and exchanges, alliances, agree- ments, treaties and the like (Table III). Interrater correlations across all events were .82-.90, indicating a high level of agreement. Six events, which received ambivalent ratings, were dropped. Although the raters had experience in research on international relations, they were not professional experts. However, the high interrater agreement indicates that the stimuli were sufficiently clear-cut that no great degree of expertise was required to categorize them. Event ratings were then averaged within each year for use in further analyses. RESULTS As the relations between two countries became more positive, there was a significantly higher level of complexity in the editorials of each country referring to the other, r = .26, p < .001. This pattern did not differ significantly among the countries. Table IV shows mean complexity scores. The overall means were 1.83 for years with positive relations and 1.62 for years in which relations were negative, F(1, 132) = 3.67, p < .06. A 2 x 2 ANOVA showed significant differences in integrative complexity among the countries in which the editorials appeared: Ms = 1.92 for Canada, 1.81 for the U.S.A., and 1.35 for the U.S.S.R., F(2, 132) = 16.10, p < .0001 (see Table IV). The difference between Canada and the United States was not statistically significant, but both countries differed significantly from the Soviet 607

Suedfeld Table IV. Mean Complexity Scores Positive Years Negative Years Country (No. of Yrs.) (No. of Yrs.) Source: Toronto Globe and Mail (Canada) Subject U.S.A. 1.99 (18) 1.68 (19) U.S.S.R. 1.93 (9) 1.90 (5) P.R.C. 2.04 (7) 2.00 (2) Source: New York Times (USA) Subject Canada 2.09 (7) 1.98 (6) U.S.S.R. 1.88 (12) 1.58 (15) P.R.C. 1.97 (6) 1.50 (4) Source: Pravda (U.S.S.R.) Subject Canada 1.53 (3) 1.00 (1) U.S.A. 1.32 (8) 1.59 (8) P.R.C. 1.18 (5) 1.24 (8) III* -II - III.- - I,~ Union by the Tukey test for pairwise comparisons. There were no significant differences as a function of which country was being written about. The three countries differed in the prevalence of positive and negative interactions. The means were +0.64 for Canada, +0.15 for the U.S.A., and -0.08 for the Soviet Union, F(2, 132) = 3.13, p < .05. None of the pairwise comparisons was statistically significant. DISCUSSION As predicted, integrative complexity was negatively correlated with international tension. This finding extends previous data indicating that international stress is associated with reduced complexity. Unlike the situation in previous studies, the events included here consisted primarily of minor or routine episodes such as international trade transactions and political negotiations. Event-related changes in complexity, even under such mundane conditions, may be an indication of how useful the measure is in tracking the impact of world events. Our data do not indicate to what extent there is an actual change in how editorial writers process information as opposed to deliberately attempting to manipulate the tone of public discussion (Tetlock & Manstead, 1985). One important implication of this finding is the unexpected pervasiveness of tension-related complexity decrease even when the precipitating events are with- in the normal range of international relations. The fact that societal opinion leaders are affected in this way by impending or actual war may have been less 608

Bilateral Relations Between Countries and the Complexity of Newspaper Editorials surprising (Porter & Suedfeld, 1981; Suedfeld, 1981, 1985); but the current findings are novel in implying a broad domestic effect of relatively minor changes in the intercourse between pairs of nations. The low intensity of these international transactions was reflected in the mean ratings assigned to events. The high positive mean score for Canada may reflect the absence of serious confrontations between Canada and the other countries studied, at least since the end of the Korean War. International events involving the United States and the Soviet Union averaged closer to the neutral point, with the U.S. slightly on the positive side and the U.S.S.R. slightly on the negative. This is not surprising: during the years involved, Canada and the United States generally agreed on a wide range of issues while the Soviet Union was in opposition to both of them as well as, for much of the period, to the People's Republic of China. Presumably, the results would have been different had we included more Warsaw Pact countries or if we had extended the study past 1989. The association between international relations and newspaper editorials was similar in Western and communist countries. Although editorials in Pravda were essentially official statements of the government (Roxburgh, 1987), the tie between governmental and editorial policy is a controversial issue in the West. Both the Globe and Mail and the Times are generally considered "establish- ment." They are not radical opponents of the system of government of their country. At times (particularly in crisis situations), they cooperate with the government by suppressing or delaying the publication of some item or even by sharing information (e.g., Salisbury, 1980). In turn, government figures frequently take their cue from these newspapers (Tataryn, 1985). On the other hand, both the Times and the Globe and Mail have a record of vigorously and frequently dissenting from governmental policies and positions. Perhaps the most dramatic example in recent history was the publication of the Pentagon Papers in the Times; but the paper also opposed many other aspects of domestic and foreign policy through successive administrations. Similarly, the Globe and Mail (like many other Canadian newspapers) often expresses its opposition to current policies (see, e.g., Rutherford, 1978; Westell, 1977). Thus, another surprising finding was the close association between governmental ac- tions and the treatment of such actions in even independent print media. The finding that all three papers show editorial changes in complexity consonant with international events may be a reflection of the direct or indirect influence of the government on the media. Another interpretation is that government officials and editorial writers share a set of viewpoints that evokes similar reactions in response to particular events. These hypotheses, of course, are not mutually exclusive. Pravda was consistently lower in complexity than the Western newspapers. Until very recently, the same pattern has characterized Soviet diplomatic state- 609

Suedfeld ments compared to those of various other governments (Suedfeld et al., 1977; Tetlock, 1988; Tetlock & Boettger, 1989; Wallace & Suedfeld, 1988). These differences may reflect (a) a greater need on the part of Soviet sources to seek clarity and avoid ambiguity, (b) dogmatic ideological or defensive attitudes, (c) different rhetorical and linguistic traditions, or (d) different goals in impression management. The last of these may involve the wish to project an image of high complexity (considering all sides of an issue, tolerance for uncertainty and dis- agreement) by Western sources and/or to project low complexity (party unity, decisiveness, certainty, lack of ambivalence) by Soviet ones (Tetlock, 1988; Tetlock & Manstead, 1985). As mentioned earlier, another factor could be the relatively high chronic tension that existed in the period under study between the U.S.S.R. and the two Western countries, as compared to relations between the latter two. Among topics for future research are comparisons of such prestigious publications as those in our sample with more mass-oriented print and electronic media; the relation among official policy statements, private commentary by national leaders, and the media; and comparisons between newspapers associated with governing versus opposition parties. The study of editorial complexity of Eastern European and Soviet publications in the glasnost era would also be interesting. The findings demonstrate the pervasive interaction among governmental actions, political climate, and the media, as well as the sensitivity of the complexity measure to even low-key shifts in international tension. Because of this sensitivity, complexity may be a particularly good variable to use in future research on mass media. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This research was made possible by a grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. The assistance of Gloria Baker-Brown, Susan Bluck, Luzbea Piedrahita, Wendy Ross, and Alistair B. C. Wallbaum in various aspects of the research is gratefully acknowledged. Correspondence should be addressed to the author at Department of Psychology, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, B.C., Canada, V6T 1Z4. REFERENCES Axelrod, R. (Ed.) (1976). The structure of decisions: The cognitive maps of political elites. Prince- ton, NJ: Princeton Univ. Press. Baker-Brown, G., Ballard, E. J., Bluck, S., de Vries, B., Suedfeld, P., & Tetlock, P. E. (1992). 610

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