Media Environments and Democratic Politics Media in a Democracy Democracy requires an "informed citizenry' The "Fourth Estate" o Media plays essential role in making citizenry informed Became part of our Bill of Rights: Freedom of the Press People have right to be informed and make own decision off variety of sources o News media considered almost on same level as branch of gov't What is "News"? Democracy: news envisioned to be independent of those in political power News is not an event itself, but the report of the event Obiectivity? o Remain free of bias o News: reporting events to be objective Became sort of code of ethics for newspapers early 1900s Go from "class" medium to "mass" medium o Before, were biased. Funded by wealthy publisher's own money o Tech changes, farm to urban centers, telegraph invention, newspapers could print nationwide events. More competition, advertisements arose Objective newspapers made most money (ads, etc) Factors of "newsworthiness" o Unique factor 0 Timeliness 0 Proximity to audience Prominence: public figures o Impact o Currency: idea whose time has come to be important o Conflict Newsroom workforce dropping--ad revenue is dropping, content changing. international news being cut Three basic origins for stories: o Naturally occurring events (weather, plane crash, hurricane, flood) o Subsidized News (coverage of news coming from other sources: PR writes press releases, press conferences etc, using clips from PR people in stories) o Enterprise News (investigative journalism) Information Subsidies o Press releases, video news releases, story ideas o Public Relations growing exponentially "churnalism?" rather than reporting/being objective about events, news is just about churning out stories based on subsidies rather than actually investigating/doing journalism
Day 2 of week 3
Persuasion & Decision Making o The Opinion-Leader Concept Lazarsfeld -whether mass media can effect how person will vote in election? Found that media has an effect: but is a "two-step flow model" : There is an intermediary: opinion leader. Someone outspoken in community whose opinion other ppl trusted and respected o These ppl influence vote decision the most o Mass media -> opinion leader -> population o "Agenda Setting" Coverage doesn't tell viewers what to think, but shapes what we think about o "Priming" and/or "framing' - How journalists tell the story, highlight certain angles :0J Simpson mugshot "Third Person Effect" - tendency to believe that media persuades other people but doesn't persuade ourselves think of media persuasion in 3rd person: them not me
Spiral of silence-fear of isolation determines whether or not we speak out o Individual differences o Perception of predominant opinion o Perception of others' op