Modeling Individual and Organizational Effects on Chilean Journalism: A Multilevel Analysis of Professional Role Conceptions

Abstract

Using a representative survey of Chilean journalists (n= 570) and data collected from each news media organization (n= 114), this paper examines individual and organizational effects on professional role conceptions via hierarchical linear modeling. The findings demonstrate the existence of significant contextual effects on the importance that journalists give to their different functions in society, although not all professional roles are equally affected in form and magnitude by the news media context. This study shows that the journalism’s more political roles are modeled for an interrelation between individual and organizational factors, where journalists’ background and beliefs tend to be more predictive than news media characteristics. In turn, professional functions linked to the need of the public and to the commercialization of news, appeared to be more tied to the structural characteristics of the news organizations where the journalists belong. The results also reveal that individual and organizational political factors predict the majority of the professional roles, while ownership and media type do not have any direct influence on the journalists’ attitudes.