Dr. Ayman Nada of Cairo University, Egypt, and Dr. Michael Haigh of Penn State University

Research Team Reports Findings from U.S. Polls Linking Media Coverage to Images of Arab Countries

The U.S. public evaluates individual Arab countries differently, and some of the differences in evaluation may reflect differences in the ways the U.S. media report on these countries, a team, including University of Georgia researchers, reported at a conference on public opinion in November.

The evidence of media effects is mixed and not consistent across settings, the team cautioned. Egypt, which has enjoyed more extensive and more complex coverage in the U.S. media, however, also has been evaluated by the U.S. public more highly.

Saudi Arabia, a major U.S. ally like Egypt, has been viewed by the U.S. public consistently less positive than Egypt, and coverage of Saudi Arabia in the U.S. media has been limited, focusing largely on how the Saudisrelate to their neighbors.

The researchers told the gathering of public opinion researchers at the Chicago conference that they could not explain changes in the evaluation of Egypt and Saudi Arabia after the Sept. 11 attacks on the U.S. through a comparison of media coverage.

Those members of the U.S. public who paid attention to media coverage of Iraq and the non-Arab countries of Afghanistan and Pakistan from 2001 to 2007 gave those countries more favorable ratings, the research team found.

The team presented its findings to the Midwest Association for Public Opinion Research meeting in Chicago on November 16 and 17.

The team included Dr. Lee B. Becker and Dr. Tudor Vlad, director and assistant director of the James M. Cox Jr. Center for International Mass Communication Training and Research, a unit of the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of Georgia. Dr. Ayman Nada, a professor at the University of Cairo and a visiting scholar in the Cox Center from January through July of 2007, played a key role in the research.

Other team members were Dr. Allan McCutcheon and graduate student Olena Kaminska from the Survey Research and Methodology Program at the University of Nebraska.

The researchers reanalyzed the responses of a unique set of polls conducted in the U.S. by the Gallup Organization that track the evaluation of the U.S. public of a variety of countries from around the world. Among these countries were six Arab countries and the Palestinian Authority.

Not all of these countries were included on each survey, though all were used on at least two. Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the Palestinian Authority were on all seven surveys. By focusing on Arab states, the team was able to standardize cultural and religious characteristics of the countries, and, to some extent, current geopolitical relationships involving the United States.

The surveys also contained a measure of attention to foreign news.

The authors said their analysis indicated that media coverage of Egypt “consistently has been more complex than coverage of the other selected Arab countries. The volume has been higher, as has the breadth.”

“For the most part, coverage of all of the countries has focused on foreign affairs, or the relationship of the country with its neighbors,” the team reported. “Only with Egypt, however, does the coverage include stories about the social life and fabric of the society. The suggestion is that a positive image is dependent on an understanding of the complexity of the society. Such an understanding is dependent on complex and complete media coverage.”

The conference, held at the Radisson Hotel off Michigan Avenue, was attended by more than 170 researchers interested in various issues of public opinion.

The title of the manuscript presented by Becker, Nada, McCutcheon, Kaminska and Vlad is U.S. Public Opinion about Arab States: Examining the Differences in National Images.