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Entman, R. E. (2003). Projections of power: Framing news, public opinion, and U.S. foreign policy. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 229 pages. As scholars of mass communication pondered over the [...]

The Vanderbilt Television News Archive supplies written abstracts for its video collection of news programs. Researchers from many disciplines use the abstracts to locate stories, track specific topics, and measure the evaluative tone of news. This study examines the validity of using abstracts as substitutes for full-text transcripts. Drawing on an analysis of the abstract writing process, we highlight potential sources of error and analyze the correspondence between transcripts and abstracts. Results of a quantitative content analysis suggest abstracts can reflect important elements of news when used at high levels of aggregation but may be unreliable as substitutes for news content., In the last 20 years, new and powerful research tools have become available to scholars who study both print and electronic media texts. Some of these tools, such as software [...]