A study was conducted to assess the impact of heavier and lighter exposure to newspapers on students' readership of and attitudes toward newspapers and on their awareness of and interest in current events. Newspapers in six cities across the United States had students in grades 5 through 12 fill out attitude and information questionnaires at the beginning and end of the school year. The study involved three groups of students: those who would use newspapers in their classes all year, those who would use them for only two weeks (or all year, but infrequently), and those who would not use newspapers at all. In the two cities in which the students in each group were well matched in background and ability, those who used newspapers most heavily showed more positive changes in newspaper reading habits, in their attitudes toward newspapers, and in their interest in and knowledge of current events. The students who used newspapers for only two weeks and the older students who used them only once a week through the year showed less consistent improvement. Students who did not use newspapers systematically showed the least change or showed more negative change. For almost half of the senior high school students, the newspaper provided in school was their major contact with a daily newspaper. The outcomes in the other four cities proved inconclusive since the classes were not well matched and there were unanticipated variations in the way the newspapers were actually used. (HOD)