comparative intensive study of the relative apportionment of matter in these papers and of the percentages of anti-social matter in relation to the entire paper (exclusive of advertisements) rather than to each class section separately. In the general news section the percentages range for mention of anti-social facts (column 2) from 21.15 per cent for the New York C

to 15.52 per cent for the Denver G; for column 3, from 10.79 per cent in the New York A to 4.44 per cent in the New York B ; and for column 4, from 9.29 per cent in the New York Ato 3.15 per cent in the New York B - It will be seen from these figures that even when the percentages are taken on the basis of the total reading-matter in the paper they are still high for this class of papers. It should be noted also that it so happened that the dates here analyzed did not include any special criminal "sensation" or "epidemic"; hence the averages are lower than they otherwise would be.

The figures so far given have not had any reference to the matter of the circulation of the newspapers. Consequently, the comparative potential influence of these newspapers with respect to the number of people by whom they are read has been ignored. The following diagram, Table VIII, indicates a more significant fact for purposes of comparison in that it shows side by side the approximate circulation and the percentage of anti-social matter in column 4 of each paper.

A comparison of the general news section and the editorial section of all the papers studied is especially to be noted in this table. It appears from these figures that whereas the Chicago D- has 20.02 per cent of matter falling under column 4 in its news columns, none of its editorial space is devoted to a treatment of these anti-social facts in a socially constructive manner (column 2), while 6.58 per cent of the space in its editorial columns is devoted to editorials dealing with anti-social matter from an anti-social point of view (column 3). The Chicago E, on the other hand, devoted 1.54 per cent of the space in its editorial columns to discussion of anti-social facts from a social viewpoint (column 2), and did not, within the period studied, deal with such matter at all from an anti-social stand

point. The New York A- leads all the other papers studied in the percentage of its editorial space (22.11, column 2) given to a constructively social discussion of anti-social matter, and likewise in the percentage (10.53, column 3) given to an anti-social discussion of such matter. The Chicago E

is

In this table the paper with the greatest circulation, the New York Ataken as 100 per cent and the circulation of the other papers represented as percentages of that. The figures for circulation were taken from Ayer & Sons' Newspaper Annual and Directory, 1910.

CHAPTER VI

ANALYSIS OF CASES

The

Limitations of space compel substitution of a mere classification of the material for the actual evidence collected. evidence consists then of exhibits of cases in which there is proof of the influence of the newspaper upon anti-social activity.

The actual number of cases of this sort cited in comparison' with the number assumed to exist is small, but the purpose in gathering instances in which anti-social stimuli were received

from the newspaper was not to make an exhaustive list of such cases. That would have been impossible within the limited time and with the facilities available. The purpose was to establish the existence, not the full quantitative extent, of anti-social newspaper influence. The machinery for getting at these cases was very inadequate, because the questionnaire method alone was available, and because this method is not one likely to bring either numerous or detailed results. Few cases are, as yet, to be found in the literature of criminology or in court records, because thus far the less obvious sources and causes of crime have been only slightly studied, and there was no means of getting information directly from persons influenced by the newspapers. Moreover, only cases of conscious suggestion2 could be collected, that is, cases in which the relation between the newspaper as stimulus and the resulting response had been recognized at the time by the person involved and was thus remembered, that is, in which there could be introspective evidence of the relation. Of those that could be thus introspectively ascertained, only a certain proportion, in actual fact, would be remembered by the persons themselves, and still fewer by third persons to whom confessions of such connections were made.

People do not always remember the sources of their ideas, impulses, and acts. For example, they frequently do not remember why they buy certain kinds of goods, or go to certain tailors. They forget that specific advertisements induced them to go, or else they may never have established in consciousness the connection between the advertisement and their activity. (Cf. Scott, Psychology of Advertising, 142, 145, 220 ff.) Just as the connection between the advertisement and the act is frequently forgotten or

'Those cases which do appear in the literature of criminology are to be found chiefly in the work of the French and Italian writers. There are, however, statements by American authorities on criminology to the effect that the press is responsible for anti-social activities. Cf. Philip A. Parsons, "Responsibility for Crime, An Investigation of the Nature and Causes of Crime and a Means of Its Prevention," Columbia University Studies in Political Science, XXXIV, No. 3, p. 190; Maurice Parmelee, op. cit., 260; C. R. Henderson, An Introduction to the Study of the Dependent, Defective, and Delinquent Classes (2d ed., enlarged and revised; D. C. Heath Co., 1893), 139. Criminal court and juvenile court records do not as yet include these data.

2 Cf. chap. iii.

never recognized, so in the commission of crime the source of the stimuli is as infrequently recognized or as often forgotten.

Moreover, of the whole number of cases remembered, only certain ones would be confessed to other persons. This number would be likely to include cases of crime alone and few cases of other anti-social activity, the former being the more likely to come to official or public notice. Finally there are comparatively few reports or records of such cases, possibly because people dealing with offenders have not as yet had their attention on this unconscious cause of crime as much as on other more obvious, because more conscious, causes. The fact that a number of those to whom question-blanks were sent refer to cases of which they have not preserved any memorandum and which consequently they do not describe shows the lack of close attention to this cause of crime. Therefore, it is clear that the number of cases of newspaper suggestion to antisocial activity which it would be possible to collect at the present time would be no adequate measure of the extent to which the newspaper has actually operated as a factor in causing anti-social acts.

The evidence of the existence of newspaper suggestion to anti-social activity which has been collected in the course of this study may be classified as follows:

1. Direct introspective evidence of such connection, confessed in every case to some third person, and the details of the act described by this person.

2. Direct introspective evidence of such connection, confessed to some third person, but the nature of the act and the details of the act not given.

3. Cases described in the newspapers themselves and stated by the newspapers to have been caused by reading newspaper accounts of similar crimes.

4. Statements from persons in close contact with criminals and other social offenders, to the effect that this suggestion exists, but containing no description of particular cases.

The exhibits which have been collected under these heads represent a mass of both direct and indirect evidence of the sug

gestive influence of the newspaper on anti-social activity gathered from a wide range of territory and from many different sources. The evidence does not seek or claim to be coextensive with the actual extent of newspaper influence on anti-social activity, but it does establish its existence and indirectly suggests its extent. 3

CHAPTER VII

CONCLUSION

1. Summary and conclusions.-The object of the present study has been to show a causal connection between the newspaper and crime and other anti-social activity. In how far and in what manner this has been done a summary of the previous chapters will show.1

Chap. iii explains the psychological process by which newspaper influences operate on activity, and lays the theoretical basis for the consideration of cases of newspaper suggestion and of forms of newspaper stimuli. The conclusion reached in this connection is that the newspaper can enter into activity in all of the ways in which it can influence the nervous set, i.e., it may be the source of initial images, ideas, or impulses that are now either the fringe or the focus of a present act, or it may be a present stimulus calling out images, ideas, or impulses that are already present.

In chap. iv a method was worked out on the basis of these principles for analyzing the amount and kinds of anti-social matter in newspapers; a definition of anti-social matter was determined upon different from the definitions hitherto employed, and founded on an objective and socially constructive basis, that is, a basis that is able to take care of all anti-social relations between the newspaper and activity and based upon a body of psychological and psychiatral facts-a definition, conse

Chap. vi, as submitted for publication, contained a mass of evidence which the editor was compelled to omit for lack of space. What appears here represents the material so edited.-EDITOR.

1 The concluding chapter was written to accompany chap. vi in its original form with the entire mass of evidence and detailed discussion of evidence included.