An Assessment of the Impact of Television New News Broadcasts on Selected Audience in Nairobi

Abstract

The purpose of the study was threefold to discover the disparities of audience personal philosophies on the concept of television new news; to examine their areas of focus and interest in its coverage and to specifically find out the impact of these news broadcast on three selected urban social classes in Nairobi. The study overall purpose was to explore the power of the themes and images of television new news vis-à-vis traditional news, and to obtain deeper insights into audience reactions to its dynamics, treatment and production. The study further sought to make a comparative analysis of the influence and impact (if any) of the modern news genre on the socio- cultural and political ideologies, cognition and worldview of three different urban classes in Nairobi. The study, which incorporated methodological triangulation, was essentially a set of traditional qualitative and quantitative case studies. Its flexible design applied a participant observation protocol and a survey, in which both formal questionnaires and semi-informal interviews were administered to respondents. The study covered 94 households in the three mentioned locations. The study showed the powerful impact of television new news on local audience and the variations on the perceptions, cognition and worldview of the three social groups. Although the findings indicated changing audience informational needs, behavioural patterns and an increasing interest in the new news telecast genre, there were notable levels of concern on its management