How the Media Affect What People Think: an Information Processing Approach
How the Media Affect What People Think: An Information Processing Approach
Robert M. Entman
Duke University
The political messages of newspapers are significantly associated with the substantive political attitudes of a national sample of their readers. Diversity of news perspectives and editorial liberalism show significant relationships to readers' support of interest groups, public policies, and politicians. The relationships vary among self-identified liberals, conservatives, and moderates in accordance with the predictions of information-processing theory. The standard assertion in most recent empirical studies is that "media affect what people think about, not what they think." The findings here indicate the media make a significant contribution to what people think—to their political preferences and evaluations—precisely by affecting what they think about.
A he belief that long dominated the scholarly community is that news messages have "minimal consequences" (Katz and Lazarsfeld, 1955; Klapper, 1960). Many media scholars still endorse something close to this view (cf. McGuire, 1985; Gans, n.d.; Neuman, 1986; also M. Robinson and Sheehan, 1983). The more popular recent view is that media influence is significant, but only in shaping the problems the public considers most important—their agendas (McCombs and Shaw, 1972). In some respects, agenda research challenges the minimal consequences view, but both approaches share a core assumption. Both assume audiences enjoy substantial autonomy in developing their political preferences. Research contradicting the notion that media have minimal consequences or only influence agendas has emerged during the 1980s (see, e.g., the pioneering yet disparate work of such authors as Bartels, 1985; Patterson, 1980; Iyengar and Kinder, 1987; and Page, Shapiro, and Dempsey, 1987; cf. Rob-
The author gratefully acknowledgesfinancialsupport from the John and Mary R. Markle Foundation and the Institute for Research on
Robert M. Entman
Duke University
The political messages of newspapers are significantly associated with the substantive political attitudes of a national sample of their readers. Diversity of news perspectives and editorial liberalism show significant relationships to readers' support of interest groups, public policies, and politicians. The relationships vary among self-identified liberals, conservatives, and moderates in accordance with the predictions of information-processing theory. The standard assertion in most recent empirical studies is that "media affect what people think about, not what they think." The findings here indicate the media make a significant contribution to what people think—to their political preferences and evaluations—precisely by affecting what they think about.
A he belief that long dominated the scholarly community is that news messages have "minimal consequences" (Katz and Lazarsfeld, 1955; Klapper, 1960). Many media scholars still endorse something close to this view (cf. McGuire, 1985; Gans, n.d.; Neuman, 1986; also M. Robinson and Sheehan, 1983). The more popular recent view is that media influence is significant, but only in shaping the problems the public considers most important—their agendas (McCombs and Shaw, 1972). In some respects, agenda research challenges the minimal consequences view, but both approaches share a core assumption. Both assume audiences enjoy substantial autonomy in developing their political preferences. Research contradicting the notion that media have minimal consequences or only influence agendas has emerged during the 1980s (see, e.g., the pioneering yet disparate work of such authors as Bartels, 1985; Patterson, 1980; Iyengar and Kinder, 1987; and Page, Shapiro, and Dempsey, 1987; cf. Rob-
The author gratefully acknowledgesfinancialsupport from the John and Mary R. Markle Foundation and the Institute for Research on