The Infotainment of Weather Broadcasting: A Case Study of EBC

• Main Authors: Lee, Yi-Jung, 李易融
• Other Authors: Hsu, Mei-Ling
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2019
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/8z555q

碩士 === 國立政治大學 === 傳播學院傳播碩士學位學程 === 108 === With the media deregulation and the blooming of communication technologies, the competition between homogeneous TV channels has increased, “infotainment” has also become a thriving genre in TV broadcast. Taking a social constructionist approach, this study aims to investigate the phenomenon of infotainment in weather broadcast, specifically how construction of scientific knowledge contributes to such a phenomenon. The research questions include: (1) What are the characteristics of the narrative contents and structures of the infotainment-featured weather broadcast? (2) What are the narrative strategies to present the contents of the infotainment-featured weather broadcast? And (3) What are the strengths and potential problems when transferring scientific meteorological knowledge via such infotainment-featured weather broadcast? The study adopted Chatman’s (1980) framework to conduct a narrative analysis of 166 episodes of the EBC (Eastern Broadcasting Company) weather program from 2016 to 2019. Two dimensions were analyzed: the story, with the aim to interpret the narrative contents and structures by describing the events, characters and scene-setting; the narrative, with the aim to observe the strategies of the presentation structures (point of view, time) and presentation styles (language, shooting lens, weather introduction). The characteristics of infotainment in the weather broadcast was also investigated. Based on the analyses, five narrative contents of the infotainment-featured EBC weather program were identified: agricultural products, cultural arts, leisure activities, general science education and livelihood tips and suggestions. By a comparison of the shorter and longer version of the episodes, the study found that the average length of the former weather broadcast is one minute and fifty-seven seconds, which comprises 40.7% of the total length; the latter version of the broadcast takes the average length of three minute and twenty-four seconds, which conprises 24.6% of the total length. Moreover, the study explored the episodes with varying lengths under the same topic and found that the proportion of science-related contents do not increase by program time. Instead, it is the event of the non-weather-related “satellite” narratives that increase with longer episodes. That is, the contents of the longer weather broadcast episodes tend to emphasize the presentation of infotainment. In addition, the study found that the invited guests of the EBC weather broadcast include domain experts, industry representatives, government officials, celebrities, and supporting roles. Except for the domain experts, the invited guests may not deliver scientific weather-related knowledge, but they could help cast the interests of the audience. Through a scene analysis, the study found that the dynamic changing scenes, including external scene connection and guided tour, theme introduction, weather broadcasting followed by conclusion announcement were meant to enrich the visual experience of the audience. The EBC weather program in EBC is characterized by a mixed text of science and non-science related discourses. For the latter, the narrative characteristics dilute scientific knowledge by adopting prominence and human-interest views, leading the audience to the program context. As for the meteorological forecasting, the narrative characteristics include timeliness, prominence and importance. The EBC weather program achieves infotainment by organizing visual and oral stimuli on the audience, such as lens setting (close-up, mid-range, full-view, aerial and data source scenes) and combining props with descriptions (personal portrait, computer animation, graphics cards, clapper, thermometer and others). They allow the audience to capture weather-related knowledge and information efficiently. However, excessive additional elements of infotainment in the weather program could be misleading and blurring the focus, particularly in the narratives of agricultural products and leisure activities. It deserves our attention that when the industrial representatives or government officials were invited as guests, embedded advertising or product placement marketing became an issue, which may involve violation of the regulations. Thus, the advertising information is often represented in the form of consumer news. The study ends with a discussion of the implications of the findings, including academic and practical contribution. Limitations of the study are also raised, together with suggestions for future extended research.