Suchergebnisse

This paper explores the economic factors that influence news coverage and discusses the difficulties of determining the impact of news content on political outcomes. Evidence from the United States clearly shows how supply and demand concepts can be used to predict content in newspapers, television, and the Internet. To demonstrate how the concept of market-driven news extends beyond the US, I trace out hypotheses about how media content in many countries should vary depending on three factors in news markets: the motivations of media outlet owners, the technologies of information dissemination available, and the property rights that govern how information is created and conveyed. I offer three different types of analyses – the measurement of product differentiation, information search patterns, and consumption patterns – to show how these ideas about competition influencing content could be tested across countries. The paper briefly discusses the degree to which market competition affects content in three Asian countries (China, Thailand, and Japan) and concludes with a section on the difficulties of designing policies to improve the operation of media markets.

IN THE 1994 NATIONAL ELECTION, PARTIES AND POLITICIANS IN THE NETHERLANDS, FOR THE FIRST TIME, HAD ACCESS TO A DUAL BROADCASTING SYSTEM. ALONGSIDE THE PUBLIC SERVICE BROADCASTING CHANNELS, WHICH BY LAW AND TRADITION HAD FUNCTIONED AS A POLITICALLY BALANCED PLATFORM, A NEW COMMERCIAL NETWORK HAD JOINED THE BROADCASTING LANDSCAPE. MEDIA ANALYSTS EXPECTED THE COMMERCIAL NEWSCAST TO ADOPT A PRAGMATIC APPROACH, WHILE THE PUBLIC SERVICE WAS EXPECTED TO CONTINUE A SACREDOTAL APPROACH. HOWEVER, OBSERVATION AND CONTENT ANALYSIS PROVED THAT THERE WERE FEWER DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THE TWO CHANNELS THAN PREDICTED.

Selective exposure to political news in social media in Indonesia is escalating along with the increasing polarization of Indonesian people. This research aims to investigate: 1) differences in selective exposure to fake news content among incumbent and opposition supporters; 2) the association between critical thinking ability and partisans' selective exposure. Repeated measures design was employed as the experiment design. Respondents were student activists of extra-campus organizations with particular political ideologies, who have pro-incumbent or pro-opposition preference. Seventy-one respondents were recruited, consisting of 34 incumbent (Jokowi) supporters and 37 opposition (Prabowo) supporters. Data was analyzed using independent t-test, a paired sample t-test, and correlational analysis. Results show that the opposition side was more inclined to demonstrate selective exposure by believing in fake news about their political enemy, compared to the incumbent supporters. This is shown by their tendency to believe and spread discrediting news about their political opponents rather than doing so for news which discredits their side. No association between critical thinking and partisan selective exposure was found. The implication of these results is that the critical point in debiasing is not necessarily predicated merely on analytical thinking ability but might also rest on one's ability to think open-mindedly.

Claims that the mainstream media are biased in favor of the Democratic Party are commonplace. However, empirical research has yielded mixed results and neglected potential bias in the dynamics of media behavior. This article contributes to this literature by using time series analyses of the dynamics in media tone based on more than 400,000 stories on inflation and unemployment from top-circulating American print media and the Associated Press newswire. The results suggest there is bias in favor of Democratic presidents. Media tone in unemployment and inflation coverage is more favorable during Democratic presidencies after controlling for economic performance. Tone is also generally more responsive to negative, short-term changes in economic conditions during Republican presidencies. In other words, bias is stronger with worsening economic conditions.