Methods
The study is based on the analysis of 50 variables that affect the information units contained in the
front pages of the Claro newspaper. The sample is composed by all the front pages published by the
newspaper, which are curated by Madrid‟s National Library in Madrid. Although the newspaper
launched editions in Catalonia and Andalusia, the work is based on the Madrid edition.
The variables are very diverse and include the placement of the information unit, the area (in square
centimetres) occupied by the units and the percentage it represents with respect to the total area of
the newspaper, the type of information unit (leading stories, secondary news, brief news, only title),
and the size (in points) of the headline.
Some of the premises of the analysis are based on the idea that “if the content and news selection of
the front page are important, so it is the number of news and the surface they occupy within it”
(Canga, 1994: 78), which has been pointed out by several authors.
The Didot point measurement system was used to calculate the size of the headlines. In order to
avoid errors provoked by unprofessional use of the measurement system -and given that
measurement has been carried out directly over the printed pages of the newspaper-, we used the