Advertiser Pressure and the Personal Ethical Norms of Newspaper Editors and Ad Directors

摘要

Newspaper journalists and advertising directors were surveyed to update and extend research on advertising pressure. Results reveal that:rn1. Advertiser pressure is widespread in newspapers; despite economic threats, however, advertisers succeed with their influence attempts relatively infrequently;rn2. Smaller newspapers do not differ much from larger ones with regard to any forms of advertiser pressure;rn3. Advertising directors are more permissive in their personal ethical norms for handling advertiser pressure than editors;rn4. Employees of small newspapers are not much more permissive in their ethical norms than those of large papers; andrn5. The amount of economic pressure a newspaper received (but not other forms of pressure such as influence attempts and acquiescence) is positively correlated with the permissiveness of media workers' personal ethical norms.