Authors: David Hatfield and David Williamson Shaffer

July 2010, 29 pp.

Abstract: As bloggers and mobile phone eyewitnesses increasingly supplement the “news,” understanding how professional journalists develop their expertise is more important than ever. This paper examines the learning processes within an intermediate-level reporting practicum course. Using epistemic network analysis, the authors explore emergent relationships within developing journalistic expertise. Understanding these relationships should be useful for journalism education as well as the design of research on learning environments.

Keywords: epistemic network analysis, ethnography, journalism

Read the full working paper: The Epistemography of a Journalism Practicum: The Complex Mechanisms of Developing Journalistic Expertise (PDF)