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In the 21st century, public opinion is widely thought to be heavily influenced by the media; many studies have been undertaken which look at the different factors which influence public opinion. Politicians and other people concerned with public opinion often attempt to influence it using advertising or rhetoric.
In media studies, mass communication, media psychology, communication theory, and sociology, media influence and the media effect are topics relating to mass media and media culture's effects on individuals' or audiences' thoughts, attitudes, and behaviors. Through written, televised, or spoken channels, mass media reach large audiences.
Agenda-setting theory was formally developed by Maxwell McCombs and Donald Lewis Shaw in a study on the 1968 presidential election deemed "the Chapel Hill study". McCombs and Shaw demonstrated a strong correlation between one hundred Chapel Hill residents' thought on what was the most important election issue and what the local news media reported was the most important issue.
Mass media's effects on both public opinion and the perception of the public opinion are central to the spiral of silence theory. One of the earliest works that called attention to the relationship between media and the formation of public opinion was Walter Lippmann's book "Public Opinion", published in 1922. [20]
Opinion leaders are those initially exposed to a specific media content, and who interpret it based on their own opinion. They then begin to infiltrate these opinions through the general public who become "opinion followers". [1] These "opinion leaders" gain their influence through more elite media as opposed to mainstream mass media. [2]
The media's bias in the upcoming election has undermined their credibility with a large swath of the country, leading to a lack of trust in the media and a threat to democracy.
This media influence theory shows that information dissemination is a social occurrence, which may explain why certain media campaigns do not alter audiences’ attitudes. An important factor of the multi-step flow theory is how the social influence is modified. Information is affected by the social norms of each new community group that it ...
Other important influences include changes in organization and economic conditions of the media, such as the growing importance of independent market-driven media and a decreasing influence of state-sponsored, public service, and partisan media. [8] Mass media influence public opinion and the structure and processes of political communication ...