Abstract
This research replicated a study by Adams (1978) in which he reported that the bulk of the news hole in local television newscasts was devoted to coverage of local public affairs and not to sensationalism or human interest stories as critics suggested. In 1992, a random sample of newscasts from the same 10 Pennsylvania stations reveals that news organizations devoted significantly more time to sensational/human interest stories in 1992 than they did in 1976. The time spent on such stories came at the expense of news coverage related to local government, politics, and education.