الملخص الإنجليزي
The study aims at identifying the role of the local media in shaping
awareness of social issues in Omani society, monitoring the local social issues
that were discussed in Al-Roya Newspaper in 2019, and getting to know about
their nature, type and importance hierarchy on the newspaper's agenda priorities.
It also aims at identifying the formats for journalistic treatment, which Al-Roya
Newspaper uses in handling the social issues and their importance in shaping
public awareness. This is in addition to identifying the rate of respondent's
follow-up on Al-Roya Newspaper and their dependence on it as a source of
information to know about and raise awareness of the social issues prevailing in
Omani society. The study makes use of the quantitative and qualitative
descriptive methods, the content analysis technique, and the online questionnaire
tool. The selected research sample consisted of hard and soft issues, which Al Roya Newspaper published in 2019. A non-probability sampling, namely the
purposive sample, was utilized in filling the questionnaire. The most important
findings of the study are that Al-Roya Newspaper has considerably contributed to
shaping awareness of social issues in Omani society and that there is some
variation in the extent of influence and awareness on the part of individuals as to
their exposure to and follow-up on Al-Roya Newspaper. Meanwhile, the content
analysis shows that Al-Roya Newspaper addressed various societal issues, using
different formats for journalistic treatment (news, articles, dialogues, etc.). This
is a fact that contributed to attracting more Omani readers to know about and
follow up of its discussions of the various social issues. The most important
recommendations presented by the study are the following: (1) Making use of the
expertise of social scientists, specialized academics, stakeholders and researchers
in social issues when dealing with these issues in the media. (2) Al-Roya
Newspaper could work hard, in cooperation with the competent authorities, to
increase community interaction with the prevailing social issues by activating
social media, opening the door for dialogue and discussions, and intensifying
awareness raising programs, forums, seminars and conferences that are devoted
to social issues
