The Ethics Of Journalism In Americ Article Analysis

In this article Sabrina Ederly interviewed Jackie, a student at University of Virginia, about a rape case on the campus. When this article was originally published in Rolling Stone, Sabrina believed that she was reporting the truth. However, she did not do enough research to make sure the story that was given to her was valid, and, therefore, did not follow the ethics of journalism. “Research ethics or norms promote the ‘knowledge, truth, and avoidance of error’ and protect against ‘fabricating, falsifying, or misinterpreting research data’” (Stichler, 2). This quote shows that Sabrina failed to follow the ethics of journalism because she granted Jackie too much freedom. This shows that Sabrina failed to follow the ethics of journalism because she did not promote the avoidance of error. An example of this is when Sabrina gave

In her article Sabrina uses the name Drew as the name of the man who raped Jackie even though that name is inaccurate. She does this because if she did not comply with Jackie’s order, Jackie would not tell her the full details of the story. The police believed Sabrina’s article and would go out and search for Drew. However, he was nowhere to be found. The police said they had “exhausted all investigative leads” and concluded “There is no substantive basis to support the account alleged in the Rolling Stone article.”(Coronel, Coll, & Kravitz 5). The article states that Drew was in Phi Kappa Psi, but no member in that sorority matched Jackie’s description. This situation could have been prevented if Sabrina correctly did her job and researched the issue more. This could have also been prevented if Sabrina didn’t give Jackie the freedom to control what was written in the article. Sabrina’s article was meant to help those who felt that they had nowhere to turn when they were raped. However, due to the failure of journalism it actually had the opposite