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Media Effects on Public Opinion. Public Opinion. Concepts of: Difference between basic values and preferences: overall views and recent ideas Organized Vs unorganized nature of opinions: specialized groups Private Vs public setting where opinions are expressed
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Public Opinion • Concepts of: • Difference between basic values and preferences: overall views and recent ideas • Organized Vs unorganized nature of opinions: specialized groups • Private Vs public setting where opinions are expressed • Whether or not citizens are informed • Hegemony (Beniger) means through which people control and are simultaneously controlled by one another through public communication
Defining Public Opinion • Nimmo—three groups • Popular—expressed privately • Mass—generally what is thought of as public opinion; culture • Group—those expressed in groups exchanges
Mass Media’s Influence onDefining Public Opinion • 1)seeks public opinion with its own research and reports findings;CNN/Time Poll • 2)quest to report others research and findings • 3)report on topics and events and group’s feelings about them
Significance • Noelle-Neumann—the management of ideas is important in advanced societies that engage in symbolic rather than direct forms of struggle. • Government that does not consider public opinion in decision making soon finds itself in “overthrow” situation
Significance • Tolerance provides for peaceful competition of ideas while ideology links opinions to a more enduring set of organized values and beliefs. • Tolerance is higher among younger and better educated. • Ideology is important because it works as a constraint; people’s belief systems are used to interpret incoming issues and to form opinions.
Mass Media andPublic Opinion • Exchange model—government and media relationship is transactional with almost equal give and take • Media has substantial impact on public opinion • Fan—also public opinion responds to shifts in media content; all media have effect
Types of Effects • Sherer—media reflect or anticipate public opinion and change their coverage and presentation as public support varies—Vietnam War • Bennett—direct impact of media on policy makers (during Reagan era) • Lambeth—press help establish agenda setting for policymaking (what’s important)
More Effects • Entman—interdependence model: public opinion grows out of interaction between media messages and what audiences make of them • Iyengar & Kinder—priming—calling attention to certain aspects while ignoring others thus setting standards (of Presidential behavior in this case)
Spiral of Silence Theory • Noelle-Nuemann—people measure which opinions are popular and which are not and are therefore more likely to express the majority opinion; this gives the effect that the unsupported position is weaker than it actually is and therefore it becomes weaker in a spiral effect.
Factors • Pressure to conform • Willingness to express opinions in public • Multiple climates of opinion (local; national) • Nature of public context • Accuracy of perceptions of opinion climate
Nature of public context • Keenan—three dependent variables of Spiral of Silence • Personal adornment—buttons, hats, t-shirts • Public display—sign in yard, distributing literature, doing interviews • Interpersonal contact—speaking with strangers and those you know; signing petitions
Accuracy of perceptions of opinion climate • Rimmer and Howard—level of use would correlate to accuracy; higher level of use/higher accuracy • Others theorize: • Conformity hypothesis (people conform to and are influenced by their environment) • Looking glass model (people projecting their own opinions on others rather than being influenced by their environment)
