Abstract:

In the scope of research on media literacy, knowledge about the media sector can be understood as an advantage for the full exercise of citizenship, in the sense that it allows citizens to have a critical and enlightened relationship with the media and the media field [1]. In an era when the consumer of media products is also "the messenger, the producer, the innovator and creator" [2, p.9], it is important to know the skills of those who will be the future media professionals, one of the groups that, among other skills, should have a deep knowledge about the media sector.

Having as reference the results of the project "Media Literacy in Higher Education: an exploratory study with Social Communication students" which is taking place at Escola Superior de Educação / Instituto Politécnico de Viseu, this article presents the main conclusions concerning the students' knowledge about the media sector in Portugal and worldwide. The questionnaire survey applied to students of all three years of the course in May 2021 reveals that the vast majority were able to identify the groups that own different media in Portugal. Although no significant differences were found according to the year attended, it should be noted that the 1st year students show a good knowledge of the media sector, in some cases with higher averages than those identified for the 2nd and 3rd year.

In general, the results are encouraging: for all the questions concerning the identification of the belonging of the Portuguese media to the respective economic groups, the great majority of the students of the course correctly pointed out the group in question (79.7% chose the Impresa group as the owner of the SIC television channel; 60.5% pointed out that the Mega Hits radio station belongs to the Renascença group; 65.8% know that Público newspaper belongs to the Sonae company; 61.0% identified that Rádio Comercial belongs to the same group as Rádio M80 and 70.7% know that the Cofina group owns Correio da Manhã. In the questions related to the media sector in the world, the students who participated in the study also revealed good knowledge, with the great majority being able to correctly identify the nationality of the television channel "BBC" (78.2%) and "Fox News" (92.0%) and all were able to identify a French newspaper and a Spanish newspaper, with the majority mentioning "Le Monde" (76.8%) and "El País" (63.7%) respectively.

The evaluation of this dimension of media literacy among higher education students of a communication sciences course reveals positive results, in the sense that the participants' perception of the media sector in Portugal and in the world is clear and consistent.

References:
[1] S. Pereira, M. Pinto and P. Moura, “Níveis de Literacia Mediática: estudo exploratório com jovens do 12º ano”, eBook, 2015.
[2] B. Abreu “Global Perspectives on Media Literacy,” in Media Literacy in a Disruptive Media Environment (W. Chris & B. Abreu eds.), pp. 9-22, Routledge, 2020.

Keywords:

Higher Education, Students, Media, Literacy.