Time of final vote decision in a national presidential election campaign was explored as the dependent variable in a media effects study conducted earlier as part of the National Election Study of 1980. Political identity, a new measure of partisanship and independence known as the Partisan Supporter Typology, was used as an important contingent…

Defines mobilizing information (MI) as any information that allows people to act on the attitudes and desires they already have. Concludes that MI is missing in news of political controversy at least in part because journalists decided to withhold it. (FL)

Concludes that in a state election, the public is exposed to a combination of policy and personal messages in the advertisements created by a candidate but that the overwhelming majority of these ads focus on the personal. (FL)

Concludes that voter response varies with the content theme, but that backlash or boomerang may be the most common effect of negative political advertising. (FL)

Concludes that both reporters and information sources felt bias was less after newspaper mergers, but that political ideology shaped the source's perceptions about the bias. (FL)

Uses psychological theories about how people process information to examine the influence of variance in question wording on public support for the Reagan defense build-up. Concludes that source cues influence the public but that such influence is overwhelmed when the public is simultaneously exposed to relevant policy information. (TB)

Researchers have put forth the idea that the mass media have an "agenda setting" function, that the more coverage an issue receives, the more important the public perceives that issue to be. A study tested the hypothesis that the campaign agenda presented by the media would have a stronger agenda setting effect than the aggregate media…

A cohort analysis of data gathered in three national election surveys (1956, 1968, 1980) was used to study the effect of media use on political knowledge, which was divided into knowledge of issues, personalities, and political parties. Knowledge levels were calculated by creating indices from open-ended questions about why a person liked or…

Concludes that voters need a frame or a point of reference for determining the campaign relevance of issues and that, therefore, framing is a crucial consideration in the media agenda-setting process. (FL)

Examines issues of the three Minneapolis, Minnesota newspapers publishing in the period 1900-1905 to determine their role in exposing malfeasance in government. (FL)

In 1972, M. McCombs and D. Shaw introduced the idea that the mass media have the ability to tell the public which issues are of major importance in a political campaign by virtue of the amount of coverage they give each. This they termed the "agenda setting" function of the media. A study was conducted to investigate various aspects of…

Reports on a study that tested the applicability of drive-reduction and exposure learning models for gratifications received across three sources of political information. Concludes that the exposure learning model was more efficient for both newspaper and television news. (FL)

Tests the traditional two-part hypothesis that partisan predispositions motivate a person to be selectively exposed to political campaign communications, which in turn serve to reinforce those original predispositions. Draws inferences about differences in these processes that exist between adolescents and their parents. (PD)

A study examined whether type of ownership affected editorial endorsement patterns and the impact of endorsements on voters. The endorsements of 51 California daily newspapers were tabulated for 25 statewide candidate races and 158 ballot propositions during elections of 1970, 1972, 1974, 1976, 1978, and 1980. Each endorsement was judged to…

A study investigated whether political interest was a factor in differences in political knowledge between television and newspaper reliant individuals. Data were collected through 353 hour-long interviews with adults in a midwestern city. Subjects supplied information about their media use and preferences, political preferences, education level,…