Media Effects on the Public

According to Doris Graber, a professor at the University of Chicago, "People who are exposed to the mass media already possess a fund of knowledge and attitudes which they bring to bear on new information. Since we do not know precisely what this information is, nor the rules by which it is combined with incoming information, we cannot pinpoint the exact contribution which mass media make to the individual's cognitions, feelings, and actions"

I agree, people do approach the news with their preexisting views in mind, criticizing some bits of information and soaking up others like a sponge. I do believe, however, that they system is much more straightforward than Graber makes it sound.

It is obvious that these effects exist - just take a look at the type of political reporting done around elections. The media can and will sway voters, but just with different levels of intensity and effectiveness. Contrary to Graber's statement that there are no rules, independents and voters who are undecided are much more likely to be swayed one way or another by the media than voters with strong political beliefs on either end of the spectrum. Stated simply, the weaker your political convictions, the more vulnerable you are to media effects.

There is a hiccup, though, in the system. The most apparent way to measure the media's effects on "individual's cognitions, feelings, and actions" is to measure the public's response to certain news reports - but how do we measure the public's response other than through media reporting? This presents a conflict of interest in which Graber is absolutely right about the difficulty of measuring media's effect on the public. The most viable solution to this problem would be to collect data through polls, and measure media effects statistically. In this paper, Larry Bartels, a professor of politics, communications, and public affairs at Princeton does just that. Take a look.