Methods

Methodically, the study is carried out as an online survey. Via the internet, Journalists and PR-Managers in several European countries are queried.

The special quality of the study consists among others things in the fact that the perception of different job-related roles of professional communicators is being analyzed within one and the same survey. This is possible because the research tool in the individual partitions has been exactly adjusted accordingly. Thereby, a complex reality model of self-conception and perception by others in each communicator group can be constructed. In most cases this information is only available in separate sets of data.

Additionally, great care was taken to guarantee the compatibility of the survey to results of general survey research such as the Eurobarometer. Therefore the results on professional communicators can be related to results on attitudes and value orientation in civil society, which next to the professional roles in the media sector have a great influence on a country’s communication culture.