To investigate whether "USA Today" emphasizes "good news" over "bad news," a study was conducted using 10 randomly selected adults in State College, Pennsylvania, over an 11-week period in 1985. Subjects were asked to rate 248 stories over 45 pages of main news columns in 10 issues on a scale ranging from 1 (very negative news) to 7 (very positive news). In a further attempt to establish intercoder reliability, the 7-point tabulation was condensed into a 3-point tabulation using only bad, neutral, and good news as a basis for comparison. Subjects were also asked to categorize stories according to length, position on the page, the page on which they appeared and whether they were accompanied by pictures or other illustrations. Results seem to offer strong support for one key tenet of the hypothesis that "USA Today" is a "happy news" newspaper that concentrates on positive news rather than on negative news by the way stories are positioned in the paper. Other findings were inconclusive. (Seven data tables, instructions to coders, a sample questionnaire, and a coder profile are included.) (NKA)