Lesson for News Values

1. Aim
• By the end of this lesson you will be able to
identify 11 news values
• KEY WORDS:hard and soft news

2. News Values
• Galtang and Ruge (analysts and researchers) outlined the
first list of news values in 1965.
• The selection of news for newspapers and broadcast is
done by the application of a set of news values – explicitly
or implicitly – by the “gatekeepers” (editors) who control
the news we receive.
• Gatekeeping is the process by which editors control what
news stories are actually released to the audience and
how/when they are released.
• The gatekeeper will select news depending on the
application of news values, audience expectations and
institutional requirements.

3. Sun Face Burp

4. Galtung and Ruge’s News
Values
News Value Definition
Size [amplitude] How ‘big’ is the event? How many people are
affected by it?

5. Galtang and Ruge’s News Values
 Size (Amplitude/Threshold): How big is an
event?
 Unambiguity: How clear is the meaning of the
event
 Negativity: Bad news is good news
 Frequency: The time-span of the event and the
extent to which it fits the frequency of the
newspaper’s or news broadcast’s schedule.

6. Galtang and Ruge’s News Values
 Audience: Does the event match the audience’s
expectations? Journalists often have a pretty good
idea of the angle from which they want to report
an event even before they get there
 Cultural proximity (Ethnocentricity): How
meaningful will the event appear to the receivers
of the news? Events happening in cultures
different from our own will not be seen as being
inherently meaningful to audiences here.

7. Galtang and Ruge’s News Values
 Elite: The media pay attention to important
people. Anyone the media pay attention to must
be important (this links to the cult of the celebrity)
 Balance: The balance of the news is a matter of
the editor’s judgement. A different news
broadcast will have a different agenda in terms of
“hard” and “soft” news, for example, depending
on the target audience.

8. Galtang and Ruge’s News Values
 Unexpected: “Man bites dog” is news! If an
event is highly unpredictable then it is highly
likely to make it into the news
 Running story: Currency/continuity Once an
event has been covered it is convenient to continue
to cover it.
 Personalisation: Events are seen as the actions of
individuals.

9. Homework
• Watch 2 news broadcasts on the same night
– one from a public service channel, one
from a commercial network
• Apply Galtung and Ruge’s news values to
the stories you have listed from your
homework task. You can apply more than
one value to each story.

10. Task
• Sort out these recent stories from the news into
broadcast order.
• Gay marriages are legalized
• Israel bomb Gaza leading to 100’s of deaths
• UK Banking Plan Faces Criticism
• Beatles first album to be re-recorded with
celebrity musicians in 12 hours.
• Use Galtang and Ruge’s news values to justify
your choices.

11. Plenary