Using Statistics to Analyze Issues in the Media

Students from Barcelona, Catalunya Escola Lavinia Teacher Anna Piñero Students Ages 11-12

The students in Anna Piñero's class examined gender issues by compiling statistics based on the number of men and women that were subjects of the first page articles in daily. local, and national newspapers. They exchanged these statistics with their partner class in Romania who conducted a parallel investigation.

We have examined the front pages of 3 of our newspapers: Avui, El País, La Vanguardia We have done this observation during one month (December 1999).

We have classified the news in 6 domains: Policy, Economy, Sports, Society, Spectacles and others.

We have counted the people that appeared on the front pages:

Men alone
Women alone
Men and women together

These are our conclusions:

On the 3 papers, the maximum number of photos are of men. On 2 of the papers there is a news with a photo of women alone. On El País paper, there aren't any. On the 3 papers there are some pictures with men and women together. The majority of news are about Policy followed by Society, Sports, Spectacles, others and Economy.
The news with women, as leading role is about Policy and Society. On Avui and El País papers the news in which men and women appeared together are about Policy and Sports. The news about Policy are those with the maximum number of men alone.

These are our final conclusions:

Men mainly represent the majority of pictures on the front pages of our newspapers and they are about Policy.