Editing Harold Lasswell (section)

=== Content analysis ===
Lasswell's study of propaganda and the psychoanalytic biographies of political leaders led to his invention of systematic [[content analysis]], the study of communication documents to examine patterns,<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Bryman |first1=Alan |title=Business Research Methods |last2=Bell |first2=Emma |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=2011 |isbn=978-0-19-958340-9 |edition=3rd |location=Cambridge}}</ref> and its uses in World War II. In 1935, Lasswell published ''World Politics and Personal Insecurity'', a study of international relations using quantitative content analysis. The study included direct observation of the aggressive behavior of welfare clients toward public relief administrators.<ref name="Almond-1987" />

Expanding on his work, Lasswell contributed to a wartime communications project sponsored by the Library of Congress. ''Language of Politics: Studies in Quantitative Semantics'' is thought to be "one of the most comprehensive single content analysis study ever undertaken with scholarly objectives."<ref name="Almond-1987" />

He pioneered such content analysis methods as standardizing the collection of information, developing categories of analysis, and using quantitative measurements to study communication messages. In the next two decades, Lasswell and his associates worked to apply content analysis to a variety of subject matters.<ref name="Almond-1987" />

Lasswell wanted to use knowledge to solve public problems. He believed, like [[John Dewey]], that one should pay close attention to the contexts in which concepts were used. For example, social scientists should express their ideas through sentences, not single words, to provide full context.<ref name="Marvick-1980" />

One criticism of content analysis is its inability to study communication effects. While Lasswell's concept of content analysis allows for inferences about data, its weakness is its ability to verify the data.<ref name="Everett-1994" />