Extent of congruence between student perception and media representations of quality of higher education institutions.

Abstract

This study examines the degree of congruence between students' use of indicators in judging university quality and media use of those indicators. Through a student survey and content analysis of the media, each one's treatment of universities is examined. The study finds that students use items related to reputation or impact when determining university quality. It finds that the media mentions reputation the most when describing university quality. Students and the media agree on the importance of reputation in determining university quality, but then agree on little else. Many items student consider important are not mentioned much by the media. This study also finds a strong congruence between how students rank universities in terms of quality and how often the media mentions those universities. This would indicate a presence of agenda setting, which is the theory that the media sets the agenda of its audience. However, an additional test in this study finds that varying levels of media exposure have little congruence with how students rank information or use items to judge university quality. This study, then, questions how much the media messages are related to student decisions about quality.