Deck 12: Public Relations and Framing the Message

Question 1

Historian Daniel Boorstin considered the press conference a classic example of a pseudo- event.

Answer 1

True

Question 2

P. T. Barnum used gross exaggeration, fraudulent stories, and staged events to secure newspaper coverage for his clients, his American Museum, and his circus.

Answer 2

True

Question 3

Focus groups are almost never used in public relations research.

Answer 3

False

Question 4

Publicity is information a person, company, or institution pays to have published or broadcast in the news media.

Question 5

Most of the largest public relations firms in America are owned by or affiliated with multinational companies.

Question 6

In the 1880s, railroads rarely used bribery to get favorable news coverage.

Question 7

In 1929, Edward Bernays convinced women that smoking Colombian cigars was a symbol of their independence from men.

Question 8

Deadheading was the practice of giving reporters free rail passes with the tacit understanding that they would write glowing reports about rail travel.

Question 9

Radio and television stations have been less willing to air public service announcements since the deregulation of broadcasting in the 1980s.

Question 10

Ivy Ledbetter Lee, one of the founders of public relations and often dubbed ''Poison Ivy,'' actually believed that honesty and directness were better than deception in public relations.

Question 11

Ivy Ledbetter Lee used PR techniques to defuse public anger over Standard Oil's response to the Ludlow coal strike of 1914.

Question 12

Edward Bernays believed that obtaining people's consent was not an essential ingredient of a successful public relations campaign.

Question 13

The first public relations practitioners were theatrical press agents who staged stunts to get newspaper coverage for their clients.

Question 14

Public relations is largely a male profession, with relatively few women practitioners.

Question 15

Edward Bernays thought that in the hands of the right experts, leaders, and PR counselors, public opinion could be shaped and public support directed.

Question 16

Women currently outnumber men by more than three to one in the public relations profession.

Question 17

The most common type of public relations is done in-house by individual companies and organizations.

Question 18

Unlike print journalists who use press releases extensively, television journalists rarely use
VNRs (video news releases).

Question 19

Ivy Ledbetter Lee and Edward Bernays believed that public opinion was rational and difficult to influence.

Question 20

While P. T. Barnum felt that all publicity was good publicity, Edward Bernays viewed all public relations as propaganda and therefore unethical.

Question 21

The BP oil rig explosion and subsequent oil leak may replace the Exxon Valdez oil spill as a prominent example of how not to manage public relations in a crisis.

Question 22

Flack is the informal term some journalists use to describe PR people who interject themselves between their clients and the press.

Question 23

Reporters object to PR flacks who make it difficult for them to get access to people they want to interview.

Question 24

Buffalo Bill's publicity agent, John Burke, used to promote Bill's Wild West show.

A) newspaper stories
B) dime novels
C) movies
D) poster art
E) All of the options are correct.

Question 25

Astroturf lobbying refers to phony grassroots campaigns engineered by PR firms.

Question 26

Exxon's response to the 1989 Valdez tanker oil spill in Alaska is an excellent example of a company's use of thoughtful crisis management to help its public relations.

Question 27

When someone put poison in a few bottles of Tylenol, company executives decided to withhold comment for a few days while they assessed the damage.

Question 28

Former president Richard Nixon used PR techniques to restore his tarnished image after he left the White House.

Question 29

The mass media devote relatively few resources to the coverage of labor news.

Question 30

Some public relations firms have altered entries on sites like Wikipedia in order to make their clients look good.

Question 31

Though most news reporters won't easily admit it, they would have a harder time doing their job without the help of PR practitioners.

Question 32

It is illegal for most companies and organizations to engage in lobbying.

Question 33

Individuals and organizations with extensive PR resources usually receive more coverage in the media than those without such PR resources.

Question 34

Companies often hold plant tours and open houses to convince their local communities that they are good citizens.

Question 35

The PRSA tends to downplay ethical issues in public relations.

Question 36

Public support for U.S. involvement in the Iraq War was engineered to some extent by an
American public relations agency via the White House.

Question 37

Ralph Nader's book Unsafe at Any Speed is credited with launching the consumer reform movement in America.

Question 38

Journalists have traditionally held public relations practitioners in low esteem.

Question 39

The fact that PR professionals often move into journalism contributes to ongoing tensions between journalism and PR.

Question 40

The Internet presents mostly problems and few opportunities for public relations practitioners.

Question 41

Video news releases are _.

A) public service announcements (PSAs)
B) aired by TV stations as part of their requirement to serve the public interest
C) produced by PR agencies and companies for use in TV newscasts
D) eagerly accepted by TV news departments, especially in large markets
E) None of the above options is correct.

Question 42

Unlike publicity, which is sometimes outside a PR agency's control, may help to focus a complex issue or a client's image.

A) VNRs
B) press releases
C) paid advertising
D) a pseudo-event
E) None of the options is correct.

Question 43

Edward Bernays .

A) called himself a public relations counselor
B) helped to end a taboo against women's smoking in public
C) taught the first college class in public relations
D) developed propaganda to support America's entry into World War I
E) All of the options are correct.

Question 44

Which of the following is not one of the reasons large companies such as railroads and utility companies engaged in public relations efforts in the 1800s?

A) A desire to get government subsidies for construction projects
B) A desire to see good things written about them in history books
C) A deep concern about public sentiment toward their companies
D) A desire to run government-approved monopolies
E) All of the options are reasons.

Question 45

Edward Bernays, who authored the first PR textbook, is more generally known for which of the following?

A) Being the first to send exaggerated stories to the press about his clients and to use gossip
B) Staging the Boston Tea Party as the first PR event, using costumed protesters to add controversy to the political statement
C) Being the first to use social science research and psychology to stage events that associated a product with a particular attitude
D) Arguing that PR is about coercion, not consent
E) Being the first to warn the public about the dangers of smoking tobacco

Question 46

One of the most successful pseudo-events in recent years was the .

A) P. T. Barnum publicity stunts
B) publication of Unsafe at Any Speed
C) elephant march across the Brooklyn Bridge
D) Frito-Lay Flavor Kitchen
E) first press conference held by Theodore Roosevelt

Question 47

Journalists like Walter Lippmann worried that .

A) they would lose their jobs to slick and savvy PR professionals
B) PR professionals lacked the professional detachment of journalists and held too much power over American public opinion
C) PR professionals would obstruct journalists' access to people in power, like politicians
D) PR professionals were laughing at the ''poor journalists''
E) All of the options are correct.

Question 48

Small media companies often use press releases verbatim because .

A) larger PR firms have more control over them
B) they have limited editorial resources
C) press releases always contain reliable information
D) a larger company's press release contains the most original ideas
E) All of the options are correct.

Question 49

Which company's lobbying efforts were so effective that they eliminated all telephone competition until the 1980s?

A) Chicago Edison
B) AT&T
C) General Electric
D) Bell Atlantic
E) None of the options is correct.

Question 50

A pseudo-event is .

A) an unexpected and unplanned event
B) an exclusive gathering for society's most fashionable people
C) any activity held for the sole purpose of getting media coverage
D) any illegal fund-raising circumstance
E) any political event that occurred during the Cold War

Question 51

Which statement best describes the current state of the public relations industry?

A) There are over 7,000 public relations firms in the United States alone.
B) There are thousands of corporate, government, and nonprofit organizations that have their own PR departments.
C) A good deal of the money and power in the PR field flows through a handful of major multinational holding companies that often own several PR agencies.
D) Most independent public relations firms operate on a local or regional level.
E) All of the options are correct.

Question 52

The first textbook for public relations, Crystallizing Public Opinion, was written by .

A) Ivy Ledbetter Lee
B) John Burke
C) Walter Lippmann
D) Edward Bernays
E) P. T. Barnum

Question 53

In the 1800s, America's largest railroads used press agents to .

A) drum up passenger business
B) sell shares of stock
C) campaign for government funding
D) obtain the right to ship coal
E) help them drop fares and shipping rates

Question 54

Communication strategically placed, either as advertising or as publicity, to gain support for a special issue, program, or policy is known as .

A) a public service announcement
B) lobbying
C) a pseudo-event
D) improper-ganda
E) propaganda

Question 55

Which of the following figures did not play a role in the early development of public relations?

A) Edward R. Murrow
B) John Burke
C) William ''Buffalo Bill'' Cody
D) ''Poison Ivy'' Lee
E) P. T. Barnum

Question 56

Usually, the more closely a press release resembles , the more likely it is to be used.

A) actual news copy
B) a VNR
C) other press releases
D) a PSA
E) a pseudo-event

Question 57

The targeted audience of public relations is .

A) consumers and the general public
B) shareholders
C) company employees
D) government agencies
E) All of the options are correct.

Question 58

Which of the following activities do PR professionals often handle for their clients?

A) Manage trade shows
B) Conduct historical tours
C) Appear on news programs
D) Produce employee newsletters
E) All of the options are correct.

Question 59

Ivy Ledbetter Lee believed that facts _.

A) should not be manipulated or interpreted in any way
B) should be avoided at all costs and it was better to deceive the public
C) were elusive and malleable, begging to be forged and shaped
D) were completely uninteresting to a public that just wanted to be entertained
E) None of the above options is correct.

Question 60

Which of the following is not true about Ivy Ledbetter Lee, one of the founders of modern public relations?

A) He wrote the first college textbook on public relations.
B) He worked as a reporter.
C) He argued that an open relationship between business and the press would lead to a
D) He thought facts were important, but also elusive and malleable.
E) He helped clients repair tarnished images with photo opportunities and well-publicized acts of philanthropy.

Question 61

A journalist might be likely to criticize public relations professionals for .

A) providing a useful press release for an upcoming event
B) only letting reporters sympathetic to the goals of an embattled company interview that company's president
C) helping them find experts to interview
D) giving a full and detailed account of the facts surrounding an issue
E) None of the options is correct.

Question 62

A public relations firm looking to make full use of the Internet can .

A) encourage clients to use social media tools like Facebook and Twitter to interact with audiences
B) edit Wikipedia entries for its client's benefit
C) hire apparently independent bloggers to promote products
D) create a blog where corporate executives can report company news and share their own observations
E) All of the options are correct.

Question 63

Which of the following is not true about PR?

A) It tends to borrow a ''neutral'' voice from reporters or public officials.
B) Journalism and PR have a symbiotic relationship with each other.
C) Press releases are one of the common types of corporate PR.
D) PR tries to shape the public agenda for private interests.
E) PR ultimately has little influence on news content.

Question 64

According to the textbook, which of the following is not a potential problem for a democratic society posed by the practice of modern public relations?

A) There is often little knowledge of behind-the-scenes public relations efforts.
B) Coverage gained through public relations efforts can get unwarranted credibility as news as opposed to identifiable advertising.
C) Spin doctors can reshape a politician's image until it bears little resemblance to reality.
D) Debate over key policy issues, such as going to war, can become exercises in public manipulation instead of public information.
E) There is a growing effort by major news organizations to carefully fact-check political advertising and expose lies and half-truths.

Question 65

Match the individuals with their accomplishments.
A. Lamented influence of PR profession on modern life
B. Convinced women that cigarette smoking was publicly acceptable
C. Helped open the PR profession to women
D. Transformed image of millionaire John D. Rockefeller, Sr.
Edward Bernays

Question 66

Match the individuals with their accomplishments.
A. Lamented influence of PR profession on modern life
B. Convinced women that cigarette smoking was publicly acceptable
C. Helped open the PR profession to women
D. Transformed image of millionaire John D. Rockefeller, Sr.
Walter Lippmann

Question 67

The claim that PR encourages reporter laziness is based on the fact that PR firms .

A) strictly control access to news sources
B) seduce reporters with bribes, liquor, free tickets, and other freebies
C) play on reporters' egos by praising them for superficial work
D) provide reporters with press releases and tips that can easily be turned into news stories
E) All of the options are correct.

Question 68

What mistakes were made by BP following the months-long oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico?

A) The company CEO made public statements about the ''small people'' who live along the
B) The company repeatedly underestimated or underreported the amount of oil gushing from the leak.
C) The company CEO attended an elite yacht race and made comments about wanting to
D) The company did not show enough remorse or compassion in the wake of the spill.
E) All of the options are correct.

Question 69

Why did the Federal Trade Commission set new rules about PR blogging in 2009?

A) It was concerned about the use of sexually explicit images.
B) It was worried about company representatives altering Wikipedia entries.
C) It was concerned about ''mom bloggers'' offering advice about consumer products while secretly getting money and gifts from the companies they reviewed.
D) It didn't like the fact that some companies had Facebook pages.
E) It was concerned that some politicians were using social media like Twitter to seem more warm and friendly when they were really cold and distant.

Question 70

The term flack .

A) is a derogatory term coined by journalists to describe PR agents
B) is a derogatory term coined by PR professionals to describe their clients
C) is a derogatory term coined by PR professionals to describe journalists
D) is a derogatory term coined by journalists to describe the people that PR agents protect
E) None of the options is correct.

Question 71

Match the individuals with their accomplishments.
A. Lamented influence of PR profession on modern life
B. Convinced women that cigarette smoking was publicly acceptable
C. Helped open the PR profession to women
D. Transformed image of millionaire John D. Rockefeller, Sr.
Ivy Ledbetter Lee

Question 72

When companies host plant tours, donate money to charity, and support festivals, these are examples of .

A) astroturf lobbying
B) social media relations
C) community and consumer relations
D) deadheading
E) media relations

Question 73

What did the California Center for Public Health Advocacy hire a PR firm to help them do?

A) To help pass legislation banning soda and junk food from public schools
B) To help pass legislation banning smoking in restaurants
C) To help pass legislation requiring thirty minutes of exercise a day
D) To help pass legislation banning the sale of foie gras
E) None of the options is correct.

Question 74

Astroturf lobbying is .

A) an illegal fund-raising effort
B) a sports-centered PR event
C) any activity held for the purpose of getting coverage in the media
D) a phony grassroots public-affairs campaign
E) the misrepresentation of a candidate's stance on an issue during a political campaign

Question 75

Which of the following is a benefit of placing press releases, social media releases, VNRs, images, executive bios, and other information on a company Web site?

A) It prevents the public from getting too interested in a company.
B) It helps the company keep its information private.
C) It removes some of the barriers between an organization and the groups that PR
D) It leads to less press coverage in the event of a company PR crisis.
E) All of the options are correct.

Question 76

Which of the following refers to the process of attempting to influence the voting of lawmakers to support a company's or an organization's best interests?

A) Lobbying
B) Deadheading
C) Outsourcing
D) Cultivation
E) Promotions

Question 77

Which statement about the relationship between public relations and social media sites is true?

A) Corporate executives can cast themselves in a friendly role by sharing professional and personal observations.
B) Politicians strictly avoid using services like Twitter because of the chance of saying something damaging.
C) Facebook doesn't allow companies or politicians to have their own pages.
D) Wikipedia encourages PR firms to modify entries for their clients' benefit.
E) None of the above options is correct.

Question 78

An example of a way the Internet can make a PR practitioner's job harder is that the public can see .

A) a promotional video highlighting a company's products
B) a video that went viral of restaurant employees allegedly contaminating food
C) press releases without journalistic filters
D) flattering bios of company officials on a Web site
E) All of the options are correct.

Question 79

Which of the following demonstrates why the 1982 tragedy involving someone tampering with Tylenol packages and lacing them with poison is often given as an example of the correct way to handle public relations during a crisis?

A) Tylenol successfully shifted blame by telling lies to cast suspicion on competitors.
B) Tylenol changed its name in order to avoid any lingering negative publicity.
C) Tylenol underestimated the number of contaminated bottles and still managed to get the public to sympathize with the company.
D) Tylenol offered full disclosure of the problem to the press, recalled its products
E) None of the above options is correct.

Question 80

How did the Exxon Corporation respond to the Exxon Valdez disaster of 1989?

A) They waited several days to send executives to Alaska to express concern.
B) They tried to blame the ship's captain for the crisis.
C) They agreed to pay the cost of cleanup.
D) They failed to listen to their PR advisers.
E) All of the options are correct.