The Psychology of Media & Politics - George Comstock (2005)

The Psychology of Media and Politics - George Comstock & Erica Scharrer (2005)

This book is about how individuals make political decisions and form impressions of politicians and policies, with a strong emphasis on the role of the mass media in those processes.

Research indicates that people discount their own opinions and experiences in favor of those of "experts" as espoused in the media. The framing of news coverage thus has a profound impact on public opinion, and political decision making as a response to public outcry. However, the choice of how to frame the news is typically made to solicit viewership and high ratings rather than to convey accurate and meaningful information. This book discusses why people discount their own opinions, how the media shapes the news, when this drives political decision making, and what the effect is on the future of society.

Issues addressed include:

• How powerful are the media in shaping political beliefs/judgment?
• How has this power changed in recent years?
• How does media influence voting behavior?
• To what extent do media opinions affect political decision making?
• Demonstrates the ways in which the media both constrain and facilitate democratic participation
• Provides insight into why individuals have varying levels of attention to and interest in politics
• Discusses such issues as political advertising, polls, debates, and journalists' pursuit of scandal
• Describes why only some Americans turn out to vote in prominent elections.
• Offers a model of personal- versus social-level influences that extends beyond politics into other important topic areas
• Brings together research and theories from the fields of Communication, Psychology, and Political Science
• Reviews hundreds of key sources, both historical and contemporary

From the Back Cover
The media have a central role in modern politics. They provide the knowledge that individuals gather and consider about candidates and their platforms, the basis on which impressions of candidates are formed and emotional responses to contemporary issues are inspired, as well as a forum in which these ideas are gleaned from and discussed with others. Through their provision of poll information, their airing of political advertisements and political debates, and their coverage of political actors, campaigns, and issues, the media function as a key player in the political arena. Taking a perspective from the field of communication, a field that places the media at the center of the analysis and necessarily draws from a number of disciplines including psychology, political science, and sociology in doing so, this book assesses the ways in which individuals arrive at political impressions, knowledge, and decisions. The conclusions drawn in the book from a close analysis of decades of social science research put recent political phenomena into perspective and have crucial implications for media and politics in the 21st Century.

About the Author
George Comstock earned his Ph.D. at Stanford University. He currently is the S.I. Newhouse Professor at the School of Public Communication, Syracuse University in the Television-Radio-Film Department. He is the author of Television and the American Child and was the senior author of the original Television and Human Behavior.Professor Comstock is a social psychologist and expert on the social effects of mass media. He is former science advisor and senior research coordinator of U.S. Surgeon General's Scientific Advisory Committee on Television and Social Behavior. Professor Comstock teaches classes insocial effects of television and communication research methods.

Erica Scharrer is an Associate Professor in the Department of Communication at University of Massachusetts and studies media content, opinions about media, and media influence.

# Hardcover: 328 pages
# Publisher: Academic Press; 1 edition (April 28, 2005)
# Language: English
# ISBN-10: 0121835529
# ISBN-13: 978-0121835521

===========================================================================

Enjoy learning Con|Cen.

------------:~~~~~~~~~~~~:------------