Indiana University

Indiana University School of Journalism

David H. WeaverDavid H. Weaver

Distinguished Professor and Roy W. Howard Professor Emeritus
EP200-I
812-855-1703
By appointment
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Biography

Professor Weaver was on the faculty of the School of Journalism from 1974 to 2011, teaching mainly research methods and political communication to graduate students, and in earlier years beginning newswriting, newspaper editing, and public opinion to undergraduates. He earned his bachelors and masters degrees in journalism from Indiana in the 1960s, and his Ph.D. in mass communication research from the University of North Carolina in 1974. He worked on four daily newspapers in Indiana (including the Indiana Daily Student) and North Carolina, and served nearly two years in the U.S. Army before joining the Indiana faculty. He was selected as the first Roy W. Howard Research Professor in 1988 and awarded the rank of Distinguished Professor in January 2010. He officially retired from the Journalism faculty at the end of December 2011.

Past positions

Reporter, Copy Editor and Assistant Editor, Indiana Daily Student (Bloomington, Ind.), 1966-68; Wire Editor and Reporter, Courier-Tribune (Bloomington, Ind.), 1968; Copy Editor, Post-Tribune (Gary, Ind.), 1968; information officer, U.S. Army, 1970-71 (Fort Bragg, N.C., and Long Binh, S. Vietnam); Wire Editor, The Chapel Hill Newspaper (N.C.), 1973.

Professional organizations

Editorial boards of Asian Communication Research, Chinese Journal of Communication, Journalism, Journalism Studies, International Journal of Public Opinion Research, and Keio Communication Review. Past president of the Midwest Association for Public Opinion Research (MAPOR) and of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication (AEJMC). Member AEJMC, MAPOR, American Political Science Association (APSA), International Association for Media and Communication Research (IAMCR), International Communication Association (ICA), Kappa Tau Alpha (journalism honorary), Sigma Delta Chi, and World Association for Public Opinion Research (WAPOR).

Publications

Author of Videotex Journalism (Erlbaum, 1983), first author of Media Agenda-Setting in a Presidential Election (Praeger, 1981), co-author (with G. Cleveland Wilhoit) of Newsroom Guide to Polls and Surveys (Indiana, 1990), co-author (with G. Cleveland Wilhoit) of The American Journalist (Indiana, 1986), co-author, The Formation of Campaign Agendas (Erlbaum, 1991), co-author, Contemporary Public Opinion (Erlbaum, 1991), co-author, The American Journalist in the 1990s (Erlbaum, 1996), co-editor, Communication and Democracy (Erlbaum, 1997), editor, The Global Journalist (Hampton Press, 1998), co-editor, Mass Communication Research and Theory (Allyn & Bacon, 2003), co-author of The American Journalist in the 21st Century (Erlbaum, 2007), co-editor of Global Journalism Research (Blackwell, 2008), and co-editor of The Global Journalist in the 21st Century (Routledge, 2012). Also has written numerous book chapters and articles on media agenda setting, newspaper readership, foreign news coverage, and journalists. Current projects: Another national survey of American journalists with Professor Lars Willnat.

Awards

Indiana Daily Student Faculty Service Award, 1979-80; AEJMC Krieghbaum Award, 1983; Society of Professional Journalists Research about Journalism National Award, 1986, 1996 (with G. Cleveland Wilhoit), and 2006 (with Bonnie Brownlee, Randal Beam, Paul Voakes, and G. Cleveland Wilhoit); 1992 Worcester Prize from WAPOR for best article in the International Journal of Public Opinion Research; 1993 Fellow of MAPOR; 2000 Fellow of ICA; 2005 Trayes Award from AEJMC for outstanding contributions to mass communication scholarship; 2006 AEJMC Presidential Award for three decades of research on journalists (with G. Cleveland Wilhoit); 2009 Distinguished Faculty Research Lecture from IU-Bloomington, 2009 Paul J. Deutschmann Award for Excellence in Research from AEJMC, Distinguished Professor rank, 2011; Indiana Journalism Hall of Fame, 2012; School of Journalism Distinguished Alumnus, 2012.

Teaching and research areas

Research methods, media and politics, public opinion and mass media, media agenda setting, research on journalists, use of social science methods in reporting.

Research summary

He is presently working on a fourth large national study of U.S. journalists with Professor Lars Willnat as part of the continuing American Journalist project that began in the early 1980s.
Recent publications include:
  • David H. Weaver, "U.S. Journalism in the 21st Century—What Future?" Journalism: Theory, Practice and Criticism, 10, 3 (June 2009), pp. 396-397.
  • Randal A. Beam, David H. Weaver, and Bonnie J. Brownlee, "Changes in Professionalism of U.S. Journalists in the Turbulent Twenty-first Century," Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, 86, 2 (Summer 2009), pp. 277-298.
  • Yue Tan and David H. Weaver, "Local Media, Public Opinion, and State Legislative Policies: Agenda Setting at the State Level," International Journal of Press/Politics, 14, 4 (October 2009), pp. 454-476.
  • Randal A. Beam, Bonnie J. Brownlee, David H. Weaver, and Damon T. Di Cicco, "Journalism and Public Service in Troubled Times," Journalism Studies, 10, 6 (December 2009), pp. 734-753.
  • Yue Tan and David H. Weaver, “Media Bias, Public Opinion, and Policy Liberalism from 1956 to 2004: A Second-Level Agenda-Setting Study,” Mass Communication and Society, 13, 4 (October-December 2010): 412-434.
  • David Weaver and Lars Willnat, eds., The Global Journalist in the 21st Century (New York: Routledge, May 2012).
  • Yue Tan and David H. Weaver, "Agenda Diversity and Agenda Setting from 1956 to 2004," Journalism Studies, forthcoming 2013.
On faculty since August 1974. Retired at the end of December 2011.