Crucial News: Television and American Public Opinion

Author: Santo Ayn
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-01-01
Features: Crucial News: Television and American Public Opinion, conceived 23 years ago at Yale University's Department of Political Science in New Haven, Connecticut. For political communication research, the 21st century has been an exciting era. This field has shifted from primarily relying on surveys to a flourishing landscape of diverse research methods. This book presents an empirical study by two renowned American political figures on the "agenda-setting" theory in the field of communication. Every weekend night, 5 million Americans sit in front of their television sets, ready to be occupied, informed, and influenced by television news. Due to the extraordinary reach and credibility of television news, it wields the power to set the public's political agenda. Crucial News first explicitly highlights the significant role that television news programs play in telling audiences what issues to prioritize, how to think about them, and shaping the way most Americans engage in political life. Santo Ayn Go and Donald R. Kinder used advanced and innovative experimental methods to subtly alter the order and emphasis of selected network news broadcasts without the audience's awareness, testing the reactions of randomly selected "typical" Americans. Combined with a meticulous analysis of national opinion polls, they show readers how events prominently covered in national news become more important in the audience's minds, while neglected news loses attention. Additionally, prominent news stories in the news stream significantly influence viewers' criteria for evaluating the president and political candidates.