Why do so many Americans distrust what they read in their newspapers? The American Society of Newspaper Editors is trying to answer this painful question. The organization is deep into a long self-analysis known as the journalism credibility project.
Sad to say, this project has turned out to be mostly low-level findings about factual errors and spelling and grammar mistakes, bined with lots of head-scratching puzzlement about what in the world those readers really want.
But the sources of distrust go way deeper. Most journalists learn to see the world through a set of standard patterns into which they plug each day’s events. In other words, there is a conventional story line in the newsroom culture that provides a backbone and a ready-made narrative structure for otherwise confusing news.
There exists a social and cultural disconnect between journalists and their readers, which helps explain why the standard patterns of the newsroom seem alien to many readers. In a recent survey, questionnaires were sent to reporters in five middle-size cities around the country, plus one large metropolitan area. Then residents in these munities were phoned at random and asked the same questions.
Replies show that pared with other Americans, journalists are more likely to live in upscale neighborhoods, have maids, own Mercedes, and trade stocks, and they’re less likely to go to church, do volunteer work, or put down roots in a munity.
Reporters tend to be part of a broadly defined social and cultural elite, so their work tends to reflect the conventional values of this elite. The surprising distrust of the news media isn’t rooted in inaccuracy or poor reportorial skills but in the daily clash of world views between reporters and their readers.
This is an explosive situation for any industry, particularly a declining one. Here is a troubled business that keeps hiring employees whose attitudes vastly annoy the customers. Then it sponsors lots of symposiums and a credibility project dedicated to wondering why customers are annoyed and fleeing in large numbers. But it never seems to get around to noticing the cultural and class biases that so many former buyers are plaining about. If it did, it would open up its diversity program, now focused narrowly on race and gender, and look for reporters who differ broadly by outlook, values, education, and class.
【小题1】What is the passage mainly about?A．needs of the readers all over the worldB．causes of the public disappointment about newspapersC．origins of the declining newspaper industryD．aims of a journalism credibility project【小题2】The results of the journalism credibility project turned out to be . A．quite trustworthyB．somewhat contradictoryC．very instructiveD．rather superficial(肤浅的)【小题3】The basic problem of journalists as pointed out by the writer lies in their .A．working attitudeB．conventional lifestyleC．world outlookD．educational backgroundB
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(答案→)B
解析：
【小题1】B 文章的第一句就提出了本文旨在说明的问题“为什么那么多的美国人不相信自己在报纸上读到的内容呢?”从第二段、第三段的内容来看，作者都在试图寻找造成公众对报纸失望的一个真正的根本性的原因。因此可以判断[B]为正确答案。[A]不正确，是因为它仅仅是新闻界的调查项目得到的一个结果而已。[C]和[A]相比较，还是[A]来得比较确切。[C]已经从文章主旨引申到别的项目上去了。[D]仅仅是为了查明原因而进行的一个调查项目而已。
【小题1】D 根据本题题干可以定位到第二段，文中指出“该项目最终所发现的原因大都是新闻报道中的事实错误，拼写或语法错误，以及许多关于读者到底想读些什么令人挠头的困惑”，在作者看来，这些发现大都是“低级的”(low-level)，而真正的原因没有这么表面“go way deeper”(第三段首句中)。因此可以判定是答案是[D]选项。
【小题1】C 文章的解题点在文章的倒数第二段中“对新闻媒体的这种令人震惊的不信任的根源不在于报道失实或低下的报道技巧，而在于记者与读者的世界观每天都发生着碰撞”这句话。也就是说，作者的基本问题是“世界观”的问题。另外三个选项都不是最基本的问题。