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Mass media: cultural effects
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Mass media: cultural effects
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Some media commentators will refer to 'agenda-setting' as if it is clearly established that such an effect takes place. In fact, it is far from clear that it does. Where it appears possible that agenda-setting might take place, it certainly doesn't seem to be a simple case of 'the media say this, so audiences perceive things like this'.
There are various conceptualizations of audiences, but it has been part of the received wisdom of communication and media studies for a long time that audiences are not at all passive absorbers of media messages. It is generally agreed that they actively choose the messages they attend to for a variety of reasons. It may even be questionable whether it really makes sense to speak of an 'audience' at all, since that term suggests that the members of an audience, however, 'active' they may be, all in some way form a homogeneous group. Perhaps in fact it makes more sense to speak of 'readers', a term which suggests that individuals construct their own individual meanings for media texts.
(For further information on conceptualisations of audiences, see the section on Mass media effects)
In an issue of the European Journal of Communication, Hügel et al report the findings of their study of agenda setting. It results in complex discussion of models of the process, which we won't go into here. However, should you wish to follow up their article, you should consult Hügel et al. 1989).
The authors, reviewing other research draw out the following conditions which affect agenda setting: need for orientation, interpersonal communication, real-world cues, issue sensitivity and issue quality. We'll take a brief look at each of these now:
As the authors point out, the notion of a need for orientation is closely linked with the uses and gratifications approach, which places the emphasis on audiences' needs, which they seek to gratify via their use of the media. If audience members feel a need for orientation on a political issue, they will turn to the media for that orientation.
Hügel et al see interpersonal communication as an alternative channel to media use as a means of gratifying the need for orientation. Although interpersonal communication is generally agreed to have an effect on media agenda setting, it is not clear what the effect is, since some studies have reported that it increases media influence, others that it reduces it.
The divorced husband who suddenly find his maintenance payments massively increased by the Child Support Agency will perceive the CSA issue as an issue of major importance. It seems fairly clear that there is an interaction between the personal experience of an issue's importance and the media's agenda-setting effect.
We have a 'limited attention budget'. As a result we 'tend to seek out and attend to information which [we] anticipate will be relevant, casually bypassing and forgetting that which is not.' The father referred to above will be seeking out articles on the CSA.
Some issues may be described as obtrusive in the sense that they are likely to be a pretty immediate concern to large numbers of people, others will be of much less concern. Thus, if we apply the news value of 'cultural proximity' (i.e. how close is it to our own culture?), then Social Security will be more obtrusive than Foreign Affairs. It is these two issues which Hügel et al investigate in their study.
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Foreign Affairs |
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The authors' results support the conclusion drawn in other studies that media agenda-setting effects are limited to unobtrusive issues.
The study also showed a clear influence of socio-economic status on the awareness of foreign affairs. Socio-economic status can be seen as 'an indicator of general sensitivity for political problems'. As well as the class differences, there are differences between what the authors term talkers and non-talkers, i.e. those who frequently discuss politics and those who don't. For talkers there is a clear effect of newspaper use. For non-talkers TV takes the place of newspapers. For non-talkers an effect of TV can be found, but no effect of newspapers. The difference between newspaper use and TV use reflects socio-economic differences. The non-talkers' need for orientation has a considerable impact on TV and newspaper use. The talkers' need for orientation has little impact on their TV and newspaper use. |
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Social security |
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The research shows that for such an obtrusive issue as Social Security, media agenda-setting effects are sharply limited.
For both talkers and non-talkers, age is the most important predictor of awareness of the issue. There is also a socio-economic effect: the lower the socio-economic status, the more likely that Social Security will be considered a major problem. The media appear to play no important agenda-setting rôle, for either talkers or non-talkers.
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The importance of interpersonal communication |
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The authors' study identifies interpersonal communication as a major source of gratification of the need for information, with non-talkers relying much more than talkers on the media for their information. Therefore political agenda-setting effects are much more likely to affect those whose interpersonal communication is low. |
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Talkers and non-talkers |
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The daily press will have more of an influence on talkers. TV will have more of an influence on non-talkers. |
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(Un)obtrusiveness and individual issue sensitivities |
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Individual issue sensitivities are central to the agenda-setting process. In the case of the issue of social security, issue-specific sensitivity (indicated by age) was the strongest predictor of awareness regardless of other factors. |
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Socio-economic status |
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Socio-economic status affects people's political communication behaviour. |
The authors suggest that it may be appropriate to replace the notion of objective issue characteristics by 'the idea of subjective interpretation processes, in which issues are individually perceived as more or less obtrusive'.
A team at the University of Massachusetts has studied the paradox that the more access audiences have to current affairs information, the less they seem to know what's going on.
In their study of the Gulf War, the researchers discovered that only 13.2% of respondents knew that when, prior to the war, Saddam Hussein had indicated that he might use force against Kuwait, the US had said they would take no action. On the other hand, 80% knew that Saddam had used chemical weapons against his regime's enemies.
In a study of the public's knowledge of Clinton and Bush, 82% could name the Bush family's dog, but only 33% knew that Clinton had supported cutting capital gains tax. The lack of knowledge of the latter policy highlights the common perception in the US of Clinton as a left-winger.
That Clinton should be perceived, incredibly, as a
left-winger might suggest that Americans are mostly stupid and/or that US
politics is so way out on the extreme right that even Clinton appears liberal.
However, as a citizen of a country whose literacy levels are far lower than its
European partners and which was prepared to put up with Thatcherism for eighteen
years, it ill behooves me to suggest either of those. More likely is the
conclusion drawn by the researchers, namely that the ignorance is the product of
media misinformation. The institutional pressures on the media are so great that
they are more likely to devote space to Lewinsky's blowjob than to Clinton's
support for private medical insurance. This hypothesis was supported by the
researchers' investigation of light, medium and heavy users of the media, which
revealed that both television watching and television news viewing were
significantly related to the tendency to support the Gulf War and to give wrong
answers to questions on welfare spending. This conclusion broadly supports
Chomsky's and Herman's propaganda model. (Source: Ruddock (2001)
: 90-95; Two of the reports are available on-line:
The
Gulf War, a Study of the Media, Public Opinion and Public Knowledge, 1991,
by Lewis, Jhally and Morgan
Libertine
or Liberal? The Real Scandal of What People Know About President Clinton,
1998, by Lewis, Jhally and Morgan
How the media may set the order of a debate on current issues
A detailed discussion of factors affecting agenda setting
Excellent article on agenda-setting by Scott P. Robinson
Introduction to Mass Media Effects
Glossary of media studies terms
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