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Economic News on Television: The Determinants of Coverage
Abstract
This paper examines the television networks' coverage of the unemployment rate, the inflation rate as measured by the Consumer
Price Index, and the growth rate of real GNP over the twelve years from 1973 through 1984. This time period includes two major
recessions, two severe bursts of inflation, and three presidential elections. A common complaint is that the networks overemphasize
bad economic news. Using two measures of coverage, this paper examines whether the television networks give greater coverage
to these statistics when they are deteriorating. The empirical results reveal that the networks do give greater coverage to
bad economic news during nonelection years, but this pattern disappears during election years. The empirical results also
reveal that presidential comments are very powerful in shaping the amount of coverage given to these economic statistics.
... The argument is consistent with theories of 'negativity bias' (Lau, 1982(Lau, , 1985; i.e. "the tendency for negative information to have more weight than equally extreme or equally likely positive information" (Lau, 1982, p. 353). The media are more likely to cover negative economic news (Harrington, 1989;Hetherington, 1996) and people react asymmetrically to an already biased media (Soroka, 2006). In other words, people are more likely to know and experience economic downturns and consequently they are more likely to react by going to the polls. ...
... Data will be made available on request. 1960, 1964, 1968, 1968, 1970, 1991, 1991*, 1996, 1996* Burkina Faso 1965, 1978, 1978*, 1991, 1998, 2005, 2020Burundi 1984, 1993, 2020Cameroon 1965, 1975, 1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 1997Cape Verde 2011Central African Republic 1964, 1981, 1993, 1993*, 1999, 2005, 2005* Chad 1969, 1996, 1996Comoros 1978, 1990, 1990*, 2002* Congo, DR 1977Congo, R 1961, 1992, 1992*, 2002, 2009Cote d'Ivoire 1960, 1965, 1970, 1975, 1980, 1985, 1990, 1995, 2000Djibouti 1987, 1993, 1999, 2005Equatorial Guinea 1996, 2002, 2009Gabon 1961, 1967, 1973, 1979, 1986, 1993, 2005, 2009Gambia 1987, 1992, 1996Ghana 1992, 1996, 2000, 2000*, 2012Guinea 1961, 1968, 1974, 1993, 1998Guinea-Bissau 1994, 1994*, 1999, 2000*, 2005, 2005*, 2009, 2009*, 2012, 2014, 2014* Kenya 1969, 1974, 1979, 1983, 1988, 1992, 1997, 2002, 2007Liberia 1985, 1997, 2005, 2005* Madagascar 1982, 1989, 1992, 1993*, 1996, 1996* Malawi 1994, 1999, 2009, 2014Mali 1979, 1992, 1992*, 1997, 2002, 2002*, 2007* Mauritania 1961, 1966, 1971, 1976, 1992, 1997, 2007, 2007*, 2009, 2014Mozambique 1994, 1999, 2009, 2014Namibia 1994, 1999, 2009, 2014Niger 1965, 1970, 1989, 1993, 1993*, 1996, 1999, 1999* Nigeria 1979, 1983, 1993, 1999, 2007Rwanda 1965, 1969Sao Tome and Principe 1991, 1996, 1996* Senegal 1963, 1968, 1973, 1978, 1983, 1988, 1993, 2000, 2000*, 2007, 2012, 2012* Seychelles 1979, 1984, 1989, 1993, 1998* Sierra Leone 1996, 1996*, 2002, 2007, 2007*, 2012Sudan 1971, 1996Tanzania 1962, 1965, 1970, 1975, 1980, 1985, 1990, 1995, 2000, 2005Togo 1961, 1963, 1979, 1986, 1993, 1998, 2005Uganda 1996Zambia 1968, 1973, 1978, 1983, 1988, 1991, 1996Zimbabwe 1990, 1996, 2002 Notes: Elections in Botswana, Ethiopia, Lesotho, Mauritius, Somalia, South Africa, and Swaziland are excluded due to the parliamentary systems in these countries. Elections marked with an asterisk are second rounds. ...
... Data will be made available on request. 1960, 1964, 1968, 1968, 1970, 1991, 1991*, 1996, 1996* Burkina Faso 1965, 1978, 1978*, 1991, 1998, 2005, 2020Burundi 1984, 1993, 2020Cameroon 1965, 1975, 1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 1997Cape Verde 2011Central African Republic 1964, 1981, 1993, 1993*, 1999, 2005, 2005* Chad 1969, 1996, 1996Comoros 1978, 1990, 1990*, 2002* Congo, DR 1977Congo, R 1961, 1992, 1992*, 2002, 2009Cote d'Ivoire 1960, 1965, 1970, 1975, 1980, 1985, 1990, 1995, 2000Djibouti 1987, 1993, 1999, 2005Equatorial Guinea 1996, 2002, 2009Gabon 1961, 1967, 1973, 1979, 1986, 1993, 2005, 2009Gambia 1987, 1992, 1996Ghana 1992, 1996, 2000, 2000*, 2012Guinea 1961, 1968, 1974, 1993, 1998Guinea-Bissau 1994, 1994*, 1999, 2000*, 2005, 2005*, 2009, 2009*, 2012, 2014, 2014* Kenya 1969, 1974, 1979, 1983, 1988, 1992, 1997, 2002, 2007Liberia 1985, 1997, 2005, 2005* Madagascar 1982, 1989, 1992, 1993*, 1996, 1996* Malawi 1994, 1999, 2009, 2014Mali 1979, 1992, 1992*, 1997, 2002, 2002*, 2007* Mauritania 1961, 1966, 1971, 1976, 1992, 1997, 2007, 2007*, 2009, 2014Mozambique 1994, 1999, 2009, 2014Namibia 1994, 1999, 2009, 2014Niger 1965, 1970, 1989, 1993, 1993*, 1996, 1999, 1999* Nigeria 1979, 1983, 1993, 1999, 2007Rwanda 1965, 1969Sao Tome and Principe 1991, 1996, 1996* Senegal 1963, 1968, 1973, 1978, 1983, 1988, 1993, 2000, 2000*, 2007, 2012, 2012* Seychelles 1979, 1984, 1989, 1993, 1998* Sierra Leone 1996, 1996*, 2002, 2007, 2007*, 2012Sudan 1971, 1996Tanzania 1962, 1965, 1970, 1975, 1980, 1985, 1990, 1995, 2000, 2005Togo 1961, 1963, 1979, 1986, 1993, 1998, 2005Uganda 1996Zambia 1968, 1973, 1978, 1983, 1988, 1991, 1996Zimbabwe 1990, 1996, 2002 Notes: Elections in Botswana, Ethiopia, Lesotho, Mauritius, Somalia, South Africa, and Swaziland are excluded due to the parliamentary systems in these countries. Elections marked with an asterisk are second rounds. ...
The academic literature provides two competing hypotheses about the effect of economic downturns on voter turnout: the ‘mobilisation’ hypothesis, according to which people go to the polls to express their discontent with the government's performance; and the ‘withdrawal’ hypothesis, according to which people stay at home on election day, either to attend to more immediate, pressing concerns or to punish the incumbent. In this paper, we test these hypotheses against novel data from 317 presidential elections in 40 African countries over the period from 1960 to 2016. We find that economic growth has a positive effect on voter turnout, consistent with the ‘withdrawal’ hypothesis. The paper contributes to the literature in three ways. First, it provides the most comprehensive macro level analysis of voter turnout in Africa to-date. Second, it proves that African voters respond to changes in aggregate economic measures, thus contributing to the growing literature on economic voting in Africa. Finally, it demonstrates that African voters behave in a way that is consistent with the ‘withdrawal’ hypothesis.
... News about the unemployment rate and inflation level tends to rely mostly on elite sources because economic statistics are usually provided by governmental bodies and economic research institutes (Harrington, 1989). Furthermore, the range of sources differs according to the topics (Knowles et al., 2017;Strauß, 2019). ...
... Hence, news about business and finance is one of the topics that members of the public actively seek from the media (Tewksbury, 2003). Despite the public's attention to the economic sector, journalists have not satisfied the public's need to know due to an overwhelming reliance on elite sources (Harrington, 1989;Hopmann & Shehata, 2011). Based on that perspective, the current study examined the extent to which the public and elite sources Overall, this study found that South Korean newspaper coverage of economic issues did not make use of a wide range of sources during the 1994 to 2014 time frame due to an overreliance on elite sources versus public sources (H1). ...
... These findings are consistent with previous studies, in that, the degree of source that was selected differed depending on particular issues (Dimitrova & Strömbäck, 2009). More specifically, elite sources were more prominent than public sources in economic news, such as news addressing the unemployment and inflation rates (Harrington, 1989). Finally, this study demonstrated there were no clear differences in the use of public and elite sources between the subtopics of daily life-oriented and non-daily life-oriented economic news (RQ2a), suggesting that the amount and the rate of increase in the use of the public sources were lower in non-daily life-oriented economic news than for elite sources. ...
This study explores the extent to which public and elite sources are used in economic news. A content analysis of the economic coverage of three major South Korean national newspapers published between 1994 and 2014 found that elite sources were more prominent in South Korean economic news. More important, although public sources increased slightly in the economic news over three time periods (1994, 2004, and 2014) within a period of 20 years, they were still less common than elite sources in daily life–oriented economic news. This study suggests that the lack of coverage that cites public sources may not reflect the interests and perspectives of the general public (the nonelites).
... Soroka (2006), for example, reported that the economy was covered in a negatively skewed manner; The Times reported on a greater number of economic news stories when the economy was in decline but did not pay close attention to the economy when the labor market, consumer prices, or other economic indices showed a positive change. The asymmetric response to the economy has been observed mostly in the United States (Blood & Phillips, 1995;Fogarty, 2005;Goidel & Langley, 1995;Harrington, 1989;Hester & Gibson, 2003). Harrington (1989), for example, found that the average number of seconds devoted by the three major network news programs to the unemployment rate, Consumer Price Index, and the gross national product for 1973-1984 was significantly greater when the U.S. economy of each domain was deteriorating than when it was improving. ...
... The asymmetric response to the economy has been observed mostly in the United States (Blood & Phillips, 1995;Fogarty, 2005;Goidel & Langley, 1995;Harrington, 1989;Hester & Gibson, 2003). Harrington (1989), for example, found that the average number of seconds devoted by the three major network news programs to the unemployment rate, Consumer Price Index, and the gross national product for 1973-1984 was significantly greater when the U.S. economy of each domain was deteriorating than when it was improving. ...
... This approach, however, is problematic because it is not clear whether the increased number of reports is mainly positive or negative in conjunction with positive or negative changes in viral spread. When it comes to the economy, both methods were used; some studies quantified the number of positive or negative economic news stories (Ju, 2008(Ju, , 2014Soroka, 2006), whereas others just calculated the number or length of "economy" or "recession" news stories (Behr & Iyengar, 1985;Harrington, 1989;Wu et al., 2004). The latter method is based on an assumption that journalists, who are supposed to report undistorted reality, report positive news when an economic index indicates a positive change and vice versa for a negative change. ...
Negativity of news coverage is widely documented. We examined whether the news media’s preference for reporting negative events was salient in news coverage of the outbreak of Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) in South Korea, which was characterized by intensification or mitigation of viral spread. The daily number of news stories on the outbreak was compared with several viral spread indices to determine if the media responded to negative changes more than positive changes. At the aggregate level, the amount of MERS news coverage was associated with positive changes. When the number of newly confirmed patients decreased, the MERS news increased. However, a separate investigation of breakout and abatement
stages showed that the media covered more negative changes during the breakout stage and shifted to more positive occurrences during abatement. These findings are discussed in light of the dynamics of journalistic attention to health crisis.
... So stellt Harrington (1989) die Frage in den Mittelpunkt, ob die Thematisierung des Bruttoinlandsprodukts (und anderer Indikatoren) in den US-amerikanischen Fernsehnachrichten negativer ausfällt, als es dessen Veränderungsraten oder sein Niveau es nahelegen. In der Tat findet er regressionsanalytisch heraus, dass die Thematisierung der Produktion zwar nicht linear mit der Produktion oder ihrem Wachstum kovariiert, dass jedoch die Berichterstattung in Phasen mit schlechten Wachstumswerten ansteigt. ...
... Es zeigt sich zwar ein linearer Effekt des Wachstums (und zusätzlicher Indikatoren). Stärker ist allerdings der diskrete Effekt von Jahren mit besonders schwacher Wirtschaftsleistung. Damit bestätigt sich eine Form des Negativismus, wie sie schon von Harrington (1989) diagnostiziert wurde. Allerdings werten Goidel und Langley (1995: 325) ihre Befunde anders, indem sie neben Kritik auch legitimierende Argumente anführen. ...
Publizistik und gesellschaftliche Verantwortung – der Titel der Festschrift für Wolfgang Donsbach ist das Credo seiner akademischen Tätigkeit. Ob als Hochschullehrer oder als Präsident der International Communication Association (ICA) oder der World Association for Public Opinion Research (WAPOR) standen und stehen die Analyse der Leistungen der Massenmedien für das politische System, der Stellenwert eines unabhängigen und neutralen Journalismus und einer daraus resultierenden qualitativ anspruchsvollen Berichterstattung im Zentrum seines Schaffens. Das Buch beinhaltet Aufsätze von Weggefährten und Schülern, die ein gemeinsamer roter Faden eint: Die Überzeugung, dass Forschung nicht um ihrer selbst willen betrieben werden darf, sondern dann zu rechtfertigen ist, wenn sie sich in den Dienst eines pluralen, demokratischen Gemeinwesens stellt.
Der Inhalt
· Wolfgang Donsbach und die Entwicklung des Fachs
· Mediennutzung und Medienentwicklung
· Die Rolle des Journalismus in der Gesellschaft
· Public Opinion and Public Opinion Research
Die Zielgruppen
· Dozierende und Studierende der Sozialwissenschaften mit den Schwerpunkten Politische Kommunikation, Journalismus- und Umfrageforschung
Die HerausgeberInnen
Prof. Dr. Olaf Jandura lehrt Kommunikationswissenschaft an der Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf.
PD Dr. habil. Thomas Petersen ist Projektleiter am Institut für Demoskopie Allensbach.
Dr. Anna-Maria Schielicke ist wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiterin am IfK der TU Dresden.
Dr. Cornelia Mothes ist Postdoc-Stipendiatin an der School of Communication, Ohio State University.
... This instability was amplified by the newly emerged independent media competing for audiences. In contrast to the more optimistic, yet ambiguous message peddled by economists and government officials, media coverage is skewed towards negative news (Harrington, 1989). The hysterical and repetitive message of doom blasted through various channels reinforces the image of a nation hopelessly in decline. ...
We evaluate changes in the perception of Romanians about their own economic prosperity and the overall economy during the transition to free markets. We use ten questions from the Life in Transition Survey measuring people's attitudes and values related to the economic situation, from three successive waves (2006, 2010, and 2016). We first conduct an exploratory factor analysis to identify potential latent constructs within the data. In the second step, we use multi-group confirmatory factor analysis to test whether our measurement is invariant across waves. The results show a relatively stable factorial structure and a relatively complex dynamic. Consistent with previous research, we find a significant disconnect between how individuals perceive the overall economy in contrast to their own well-being, but with a Romanian twist. Most people consider their personal situation is improving; yet, at the same time, they perceive the economy is progressively deteriorating. We contend this perception disconnect is due to a combination of biases, including, but not limited to, availability bias and social contagion. We strongly suspect the culturally embedded lack of social trust, so pervasive in Romania, is also part of the explanation. To our knowledge, this is the first research that systematically investigates the perception of economic development during the transition process in Romania across multiple periods of time. Our findings underscore the challenge this perception disconnects poses to understanding and anticipating public responses to long-term growth strategies and policies. We dub this unique cultural fatalism "the Mioritic Syndrome."
... Another notion of newsworthiness that is potentially relevant is that negative events may be considered more newsworthy than positive ones. That negative economic news are indeed considered more newsworthy by news organizations is shown by Harrington (1989), who documents that network television news overemphasize bad economic news. Similarly, Soroka (2012) documents that bad news about unemployment, inflation and interest rates are more likely to be reported by the New York Times than good news about the same variables. ...
We formalize the editorial role of news media in a multisector economy and show that media can be an independent source of business cycle fluctuations, even when they report accurate information. Public reporting about a subset of sectoral developments that are newsworthy but unrepresentative causes firms across all sectors to hire too much or too little labor. We construct historical measures of US sectoral news coverage and use them to calibrate our model. Time-varying media focus generates demand-like fluctuations that are orthogonal to productivity, even in the absence of non-TFP shocks. Presented with historical sectoral productivity, the model reproduces the 2009 Great Recession. (JEL D22, D83, E32, L82)
... Açıkçası, buradaki önemli soru medyanın hangi ulusal sorunları ya da olayları daha erişilebilir hâle getirdiğidir (ekonomi açısından bu konunun genel bir tartışması için bkz. Behr ve Iyengar, 1985;Harrington, 1989). Medya tarafından seçilen sorunlar ve sorunların aktarıldığı haber çerçeveleri "gerçek dünya"ya mı yok-sa siyasal partiler ve adaylar tarafından çizilen dünyaya mı uygun düşmektedir? ...
... For example, crime reporting follows a different trend than the real indicators of crime (Lawrence & Mueller, 2003). The same holds for the involvement of minorities in riots (Entman, 1994), political scandals (Cappella & Jamieson, 1997;Semetko & Schoenbach, 2003), episodes of corruption (Soroka & McAdams, 2015), transport accidents (van Der Meer et al., 2019), and long-term socioeconomic trends (Gibson & Zillmann, 1994;Harrington, 1989;Kollmeyer, 2004). Empirical studies document that the negativity bias is stronger in the news making of issues related to politics and economic policy (Elejalde et al., 2018;Hester & Gibson, 2003;Kepplinger et al., 2012;Lengauer et al., 2012). ...
We study the impact of the media negativity bias on tax compliance. Through a framed laboratory experiment, we assess how the exposure to biased news about government action affects compliance in a repeated taxation game. Subjects treated with positive news are significantly more compliant than the control group. Instead, the exposure to negative news does not prompt any signicant reaction compared to the neutral condition,
suggesting that participants may perceive the media negativity bias in the selection and tonality of news as the norm rather than the exception.
Overall, our results suggest that biased news provision is a constant source of psychological priming and plays a vital role in taxpayers' compliance decisions.
... Fogarty mentions that business news coverage does not cover all parties, and business news reflects competition and election issues (Fogarty, 2005). Harrington finds out that televisions give more coverage when the economy is good or bad, and those election years do not cover the negative economy (Harrington, 1989). Ju's study examines whether negatively skewed economic news coverage and its influences on public perception of the economy can be demonstrated in South Korea (Ju, 2006). ...
Background: In recent years, various studies have raised the issue of economic progress in Bangladesh. Therefore, the government's various economic steps for the development of Bangladesh next year are very significant. The development of a country depends on its economy. The media has a big role to play in keeping the economy dynamic and strong. Various media information about the economy helps the government and the people to make any decision.
Method: The study of mixed-mode has been conducted through content analysis. As a research sample, two well-known dailies of Bangladesh, Prothom Alo and The Financial Express have been selected as the medium of purposive sampling. Media Political Economy is the theoretical framework of this research.
Result: The results show that the two newspapers have a total of 235 pieces of economic news. 64% of the news is straight news and 36% in-depth news. Although Prothom Alo has done most of its investigative reporting on various irregularities, it has focused on remittances, import-export, and the banking sector. And The Financial Express covers in-depth news on development, investment, prospects, and energy. The economic news coverage of The Financial Express was better than Prothom Alo. However, Bangladesh is going through a critical period in terms of economy, the two newspapers should have published more economic news with in-depth news. Although there are some reports about irregularities in the country's financial sector, the amount of information and coverage is not enough.
Conclusion: The media plays the role of a watchdog of society. Many financial irregularities in the country will be stopped if the media monitors various issues of the financial sector impartially and actively. The role of media is essential for the economic prosperity of the country.
... The overrepresentation of negative information in economic news is well documented: Studies report negativity biases in different types of outlets and across national contexts (e.g., Hagen, 2005;Harrington, 1989;Hester & Gibson, 2003;Ju, 2008;Soroka, 2006Soroka, , 2012Soroka, , 2014Soroka, Stecula & Wlezien, 2015;. When it comes to journalistic decision-making processes, one can identify two common approaches in the literature. ...
... Negative stories are selected more frequently by the press as news to report about, as they tend to be seen as more "newsworthy" (e.g. Soroka 2012;Altheide 1997;Harrington 1989;Patterson 1994;Moy & Pfau 2000;Shoemaker et al. 1987: 348;Soroka 2006; 1 Hood 2011: 10f.). Following the logic of the negativity bias, it should be expected that shaming can attract more attention than branding. ...
Social media increasingly shapes the way in which we perceive conflicts and conflict parties abroad. Conflict parties, therefore, have started using social media strategically to influence public opinion abroad. This book explores the phenomenon by examining, (1) which strategies of external communication conflict parties use during asymmetric conflicts and (2) what shapes the selection of these communication strategies. In a comprehensive case study of the conflict in Israel and Palestine, Bernd Hirschberger shows that the selection of strategies of external communication is shaped by the (asymmetric) conflict structure.
The full text of the book is downloadable (open access) on the website of transcript publishing: https://www.transcript-verlag.de/978-3-8376-5509-4/external-communication-in-social-media-during-asymmetric-conflicts/
Endorsement:
»Bernd Hirschberger’s new book is to be welcomed as an important and original contribution to a recently transformed aspect of intense political conflict. The subject of external communication by conflicting parties has always been a major aspect of study in relation to propaganda and public diplomacy. But this book considers the topic more broadly in a context where the revolution in social media at all levels has irrevocably transformed the situation. At the heart of this analysis lies the deep question of asymmetry of power in all its forms and how strategies of external communication are shaped by underlying conflict structures and the operational environment. Hirschberger’s book is thoroughly researched and impeccable in its critical methodology, considering alternative theses and checking the central ›quantifying qualitative‹ approach with large-scale ›automated quantitative‹ data on the one hand and interviews on the other. Above all, mercifully free of jargon, the paraphernalia of scholarship is not allowed to obscure the clarity of the central argument. An abundance of detailed examples taken from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, together with helpful conceptual tables, accompany the central thesis that in this asymmetric conflict the selection of strategies for external communication differ sharply as a result of the asymmetric relationship between the ›top dog‹ (the State of Israel) and the ›under dog‹ (the PLO/PNA and Hamas). For the former strategic interest dictates a ›branding‹ strategy to transmit a positive image of Israel that resonates with prevailing values in the recipient societies. For the latter strategic interest dictates a ›shaming‹ strategy that strikes a powerful chord with international ethical-legal norms. This theme is powerfully presented. It is suggested that this may find an echo in other asymmetric conflicts. And that there are important lessons for conflict theorists and conflict resolution practitioners, and for educationalists and the social media, as well as for Israelis and Palestinians themselves in their continuing struggles to elicit third party support.« (Oliver Ramsbotham, University of Bradford)
... 32 To verify whether the reaction of consumer confidence to monetary policy news depends importantly on the direction of the 30 Results for local projections are in Appendix A.6. 31 See for instance Barberis, Shleifer, and Vishny (1998), Eil andRao (2011), andTutino (2013). 32 See for instance Harrington (1989) or Soroka (2006). change in the policy stance, we extend our baseline specification to allow the coefficients to depend on the sign of the policy shocks. ...
... Comparing economic news with real economic figures, scholars have identified this type of bias in newspapers (e.g. Soroka, 2006) as well as on television (Harrington, 1989). ...
Research on economic and financial journalism has left important questions unanswered. Most notably, what exactly are the mechanisms leading up to the well-documented negativity bias in economic news reporting, and to what extent are structural constraints, previously identified in research on financial news production, also relevant in the context of mainstream economic news that reaches out to a broad and lay audience? This study seeks to address these questions by conducting in-depth interviews with 12 economic journalists working for Dutch news outlets (print, online, and television). The findings suggest that negativity is driven more by news values than by journalistic role conceptions, as many interviewees refer to the abrupt temporal dynamics typical of negative events. Furthermore, journalists indicate that gatekeeping processes are increasingly influenced by audience preferences, as indicators such as aging readerships and number of clicks are carefully monitored.
... These results are bad news for those attempting to explain pro-globalization policies as their ability to increase individuals' support for things such as trade liberalization by extolling the national benefits seems rather limited. In addition, studies on US media reporting (Groeling & Baum, 2008;Harrington, 1989) have found that, first, negativity is pervasive in modern news coverage (Groeling & Baum, 2008, p. 1068 and that second there is a strong domination of negative media coverage on globalization and trade policy issues (Heinz & Swinnen, 2015;Swinnen & Francken, 2006). In light of the present results, constant media negativity bias on trade may further add to the deteriorating approval rate of international trade. ...
Economic self-interest has been central to explaining individual trade preferences. Depending on the theoretical trade model different variables influence individuals’ attitude towards globalization and existing research has come to different conclusions as to whether individuals’ preferences are dependent on skill level, income or the sector of employment. Other studies depart from economic self-interest by arguing that it is not self-interest that motivates individuals to form their preference, but country-level economic factors (sociotropic considerations) instead. We argue that one needs to approach trade preference formation from an information-based perspective and we test experimentally how people react if they are aware that they personally or nationally will gain or lose from trade and which of the two aspects are more important. By using survey experiments embedded in a representative national survey in the U.S. we are able to differentiate whether a person was triggered by ego- or sociotropic benefits/costs of free trade.
... Hetherington's (1998) study found that economic news can be increasingly biased during a contextual change in the political arena. Harrington (1989), in an earlier study, found that TV economic news coverage applies a higher volume on negative tone during election years. Mutz (1992) and Shah, Watts, Domke, Fan, and Fibison (1999) found that the incumbent president tends to get positive news portrayal in the light of economy when the economic performance of the country is good. ...
Current literature on economic news coverage mainly focuses on the economic news about domestic economy. This study asks a further question: will international economic news be accurately reflecting the economic performance of a foreign country? This study takes China as the target country and economic news coverage from other countries from the Global Database of Events, Language and Tone for this research and constructs a Poisson Lagged Regression model for news volume and compares autoregressive conditional heteroskedasticity model versus autoregressive integrated moving average model for economic news tone change. The results show that international economic news coverage is largely different from domestic news coverage, and the attention of foreign news on Chinese economy is negativity related to the performance of the Shanghai Stock Index. Moreover, the economic news tone about China's economy showed a seasonal pattern.
... Numerous studies prove that media tend to cover different events in a negative light (Leung and Lee, 2015). Bad news gets reported more often and for a longer time than good news does (Blondheim et al, 2015;Harrington, 1989;Lowry, 2008;Nadeau et al., 1999). Many media outlets liked Navalny more as a negative character than as a good anticorruption campaigner because scandals and sensations drive traffic, thereby increasing the demand for the content of the media outlet (McManus, 1994). ...
This article analyses the discourse about the opposition politician Alexei Navalny in Russian media. Navalny has been actively engaging with his audience through social media and online platforms; however, some media continue to ignore the politician, practically not covering his activities. The article analyses the intensity and sentiment of the media coverage of Navalny based on data from Medialogia. It is concluded that the media in general do cover the politician’s activities and attempts to deliberately ignore news about him are only made by TV stations. However, news about Navalny is often negative. While blogs offer a more positive outlook on the politician’s activities than do the other types of media that the article considers, the majority of the coverage of Navalny in Russian media is of a critical nature. In addition, an analysis of positive and negative news in various types of media suggests that the way the politician’s activities are covered primarily involves not information about what he did or did not do but rather the various media interpretations of these actions.
... They also revealed how inflation became a weighting factor for the adoption of market reforms (Biglaiser and DeRouen 2004). Cultural and media studies analysed the place of experts, media coverage and event framing (Mata and Lemercier 2010;Harrington 1989). For macro-sociologists, inflation was associated with distributive conflicts, stressing its social and political causes (Baumgartner and Burns 1980). ...
Our argument is that, if we suspend disciplinary distinctions, inflation reveals two contrasting modes of representing the economy. At least in Argentina, the growing concern about inflation is related to the consolidation of price indexes and the rise of economists as
primary actors in public and political life. Numbers and experts did not just add new terminology and interpreters to inflation analyses, they completely changed the way societies and authorities act to tame price rises.
... But we also know that this responsiveness is biased in important ways. For one, the media are much more responsive to negative news than to positive news (Altheide, 1997;Harrington, 1989;Soroka, 2006Soroka, , 2012. In part, this is due to editorial determinations of newsworthiness and a reaction to audience preferences (Soroka, 2006;Trussler & Soroka, 2014), which may be slanted towards negativity for reasons of evolutionary psychology (Soroka, 2014). ...
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.
... But we also know that this responsiveness is biased in important ways. For one, the media are much more responsive to negative news than to positive news (Altheide, 1997;Harrington, 1989;Soroka, 2006Soroka, , 2012. In part, this is due to editorial determinations of newsworthiness and a reaction to audience preferences (Soroka, 2006;Trussler & Soroka, 2014), which may be slanted towards negativity for reasons of evolutionary psychology (Soroka, 2014). ...
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 and the exploration of observable implications of a biased media environment. This paper contributes to this literature by using time series analyses of the dynamics in media tone based on over 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.
... Within the rational-agent framework, this may result from impediments to trade and/or from lower investor recognition leading to lower diversification [10]. Another mechanism could be associated with the fact that most of the coverage of mass media is negative [15,23]. ...
The media plays a central role in monitoring powerful institutions and identifying any activities harmful to the public interest. In the investing sphere constituted of 46,583 officially listed domestic firms on the stock exchanges worldwide, there is a growing interest `to do the right thing', i.e., to put pressure on companies to improve their environmental, social and government (ESG) practices. However, how to overcome the sparsity of ESG data from non-reporting firms, and how to identify the relevant information in the annual reports of this large universe? Here, we construct a vast heterogeneous information network that covers the necessary information surrounding each firm, which is assembled using seven professionally curated datasets and two open datasets, resulting in about 50 million nodes and 400 million edges in total. Exploiting this heterogeneous information network, we propose a model that can learn from past adverse media coverage patterns and predict the occurrence of future adverse media coverage events on the whole universe of firms. Our approach is tested using the adverse media coverage data of more than 35,000 firms worldwide from January 2012 to May 2018. Comparing with state-of-the-art methods with and without the network, we show that the predictive accuracy is substantially improved when using the heterogeneous information network. This work suggests new ways to consolidate the diffuse information contained in big data in order to monitor dominant institutions on a global scale for more socially responsible investment, better risk management, and the surveillance of powerful institutions.
... Lau (1982: 353) defines negativity as the "tendency for negative information to have more weight than equally extreme or equally likely positive information." Several studies have shown that the media gives much more coverage to negative economic news than to positive economic fluctuations (Harrington, 1989;Hetherington, 1996). The public reacts asymmetrically to an already biased media content and to the economy itself (Soroka, 2006). ...
Do economic hardships affect electoral participation? Using cross-sectional data for 44 countries in Africa, Asia, Europe and Latin America between 1996 and 2013, we find that individual-level attributes and structural factors shape voters’ reaction to economic adversity. This paper presents empirical evidence showing that economic downturns affect electoral participation. However, macroeconomic fluctuations have heterogeneous effects. While poorer and less educated citizens are more likely to increase their level of turnout during periods of economic adversity, the rate of participation of individuals with a higher socioeconomic status is not affected by economic downturns. Moreover, we demonstrate that the negative impact of economic hardships on the likelihood of electoral participation of the most vulnerable socioeconomic groups is mostly found in countries that are less inserted into the global economy and in states that offer weaker welfare protections.
... Thus, news from the mass media is verifiable whereas information from the minority party is unverifiable. 23 Negative news tends to be reported more than positive news (e.g., Harrington, 1989;Patterson, 1997;Soroka, 2006). Even if the news that the majority party proposes the optimal policy is profitable, the result holds as long as the revenue of reporting such news ′ a is small so that ϕ ′ a m ≤ holds. ...
There often exists a supermajority rule that enables the minority party to delay or prevent a vote on a bill. I construct a two‐period model consisting of a representative voter, self‐interested parties, and a media outlet. In the model, the majority party has an incentive to misrepresent the voter's optimal policy. I show that the minority party's attempt to block a vote (e.g., a filibuster) can signal this misrepresentation. Interestingly, the key is that the minority party and the mass media are complementary in creating the signal. Overall, the results suggest that supermajority rules could be beneficial even for the majority of voters.
... First, the pervasive nature of economic crises means that many individuals will come into contact with the economy beyond the group of individuals who are directly affected. We know that negative economic performance is disproportionately covered by the mass media (e.g., Goidel and Langley 1995;Harrington 1989;Soroka 2006). Heightened press coverage of the economy makes macroeconomic information readily accessible to the public, also through political discussion and via social media (Eveland and William 2004). ...
A strong argument can be made for the prime importance of information in the context of an economic recession. It is in times of crisis that information on the state of the economy is abundant and citizens have incentives to acquire it in order to sanction incumbents for mismanagement of the economy. Simultaneously, however, economic hardship strains people’s cognitive resources and motivations to seek relevant information. Using a novel research design, we assess how the recent economic recession has shaped information acquisition. Our results indicate that while personal economic hardship depresses levels of information, the recession overall boosted considerably the public’s knowledge of the state of the economy and, to a lesser degree, of parties’ policy positions in elections. For both economic and electoral types of information, economically marginal groups caught up to the economically secure in contexts of economic hardship, thereby reducing information inequalities. We discuss the findings’ implications for representative democracy.
... Negativity biases have been found in newspaper reporting on a range of economic issues: recession news (Wu, Stevenson, Chen, & Güner, 2002), employment and inflation (Soroka, 2006(Soroka, , 2012, and macroeconomic news generally (Goidel & Langley, 1995;Hagen, 2005;Hester & Gibson, 2003;Soroka et al., 2015;van Dalen, de Vreese, & Albaek, 2015). This is the case for both print media as well as television news broadcasts (Hester & Gibson, 2003) and for economic news generally as well as for specific subthemes such as unemployment, inflation, and growth rates (Harrington, 1989). ...
This article studies the tripartite relationship between the economy, economic news, and public economic perceptions. Our analysis is twofold: We investigate the impact of the real economy on economic news in Dutch newspapers (2002-2015, N = 127,120); second, we analyze the impact of economic news on public economic perceptions. Our empirical approach builds on and contributes to the literature by making nuanced distinctions between (a) economic levels and changes (positive/negative), (b) volume and tone of coverage (positive/negative), and, most importantly, (c) people’s retrospective and prospective economic judgments. Our analyses show that the public is presented a version of economic reality that is skewed to the negative, which strongly affects people’s economic expectations but not evaluations. Extending media-dependency theory, these results demonstrate the necessity to both conceptually and empirically distinguish between people’s retrospective and prospective judgments.
This paper aims to investigate the possibility that electoral campaigning transmits truthful information in a situation where campaigning has a direct persuasive effect on a subset of the electorate called “naïve voters.” To this end, we construct a multi-sender signaling game in which an incumbent and a challenger decide whether to focus on policy or ability in electoral campaigning, and a media outlet then decides whether to gather news. Voters are divided into sophisticated and naïve voters. We demonstrate that a candidate's strategy regarding their issues of focus (campaign messages) can signal his or her private information. Specifically, negative campaigning against the incumbent's ability signals the incumbent's low ability in all separating equilibria. It is also noteworthy that separating equilibria exist only when sophisticated and naïve voters coexist. This implies that a fraction of naïve voters has a non-monotonic effect on the possibility of transmitting truthful information.
This paper describes the role of the media in the emotional response of societies to the present and to post-enlightenment promise of progress. Fukuyama’s “end of history” has prevailed, as modern democracy has not been seriously challenged, and technological developments have brought prosperity to a huge amount of people. But the media has a contradictory position towards this, as it praises material and technological progresses while at the same time delighting itself in presenting a decaying world. Traditionally, western media has oscillated between a conservative stance focused on objectivity, in the school of W. Lippmann, and a progressive ethos aiming to change the world for the better, in J. Dewey’s rebuttal to the former. But contemporary news outlets are unable to conciliate civic stability and material development with their stance towards an idealistic future, as bad news, not necessarily more marketable per se, are more naturally put forward by the media’s distrust of other civic and political actors. I argue that today’s negative emotional climate derives from that failed interaction between such dire portraits and present-day progress, as politicians and democratic systems are unable to react to this. Excerpts from contemporary global media outlets (CNN, Fox News, BBC World) illustrate the point, while insights are provided on the roots of free-press in the classical liberalism of the nineteenth century, focusing on the primacy of the individual in Locke and J. Stuart Mill, in contrast with the current progressivist ethos, influenced by Comte and Marx, taught in journalism and liberal arts programmes.
This article explores to what extent the euro crisis brought about unprecedented attention to the European Union (EU) and if so with what consequences on the media visibility of different political actors in Spain. Drawing on a database of more than 27,000 stories published in the most read Spanish newspaper from 2004 to 2012, we demonstrate that following the outbreak of the crisis, executive elites receive more media coverage than social movements, trade unions, and challenger parties critical with EU policies and decisions. The media coverage of EU affairs, however, is not business as usual. Executive elites receive disproportionate media attention but they are no longer presented using the EU following credit-claiming strategies. Our results also indicate that the media are not passive actors that respond to institutional determinants but might be actively involved in the process of giving some actors more visibility in public debates on EU affairs.
В настоящей статье анализируется влияние экономических и политических институтов на внимание ведущих печатных СМИ стран Большой двадцатки к политическим лидерам. На основе ресурса Factiva, содержащий тексты публикаций 35 тысяч СМИ из 159 стран мира, была собрана база данных о числе упоминаний лидеров стран в пяти ведущих изданиях всех стран Большой двадцатки за 2018 г. Кроме того, мы используем данные Institutional Quality Index для оценки качества институтов в изучаемых нами странах. Исследование выполнено с использованием теории глобального новостного потока и концепции политической персонализации. Мы показываем, что внимание к лидерам стран с хорошими экономическими институтами выше, чем к лидерам стран с плохими экономическими институтами. Однако связь с политическими институтами обратная: больше внимания получают лидеры стран с плохими политическими институтами. Кроме того, результаты показывают, что СМИ стран с более развитыми экономическими институтами реже упоминают лидеров стран с менее развитыми экономическими институтами. Но для различий в политических институтах ситуация обратная: СМИ стран с более развитыми политическими институтами чаще упоминают лидеров стран с плохими политическими институтами. Можно сделать вывод о том, что лидеры авторитарных стран стремятся участвовать в формировании повестки дня и добиваться более высокого уровня внимания к себе вопреки экономическим факторам. Настоящее исследование дополняет теорию глобального новостного потока указанием на то, что политические факторы имеют не меньшее значение в формировании международной повестки дня, чем экономические.
The paper considers the asymmetry of information waves and the relation of their news trails with market indicators and exchange rates. It draws on the crises of 1998, 2008 and 2014. The relationship between information waves and scenarios for the development of economic crises is established by comparing the frequency characteristics of certain phrases in the media and the group of financial indicators. A comparative and content analysis shows that the representation of crises in the Russian media coincides with the real state of the national economy only at the initial stage, after which the crises cease to be reflected in economic thinking in accordance with their significance. Thus, the paper concludes that the scale of economic crises is predictable in terms of the size of the information waves’ acute phase generated by these crises.
В статье дается обзор информационных и импульсноволновых механизмов взаимодействия средств массовой информации
и социума, предлагается модель, создающая предпосылки для использования математического аппарата в прогнозировании результатов воздействия информационных волн, генерируемых СМИ, на информационное поле общества. Применение научных категорий из естественных
наук позволяет представить воздействие средств массовой информации на общество в виде импульсов, выводящих индивидов из равновесия на более или менее продолжительное время. Находясь в неравновесном состоянии, индивиды совершают некоторые колебания,
постепенно затухающие до появления следующих информационных
импульсов. Такого рода колебания неоднородны, зависят от качественных особенностей конкретного индивида и могут быть классифицированы по уровням: физические, эмоциональные, интеллектуальные
и ценностно-смысловые. Инициируемые СМИ импульсы вызывают в
обществе волновой отклик, изменяющий качества однородных групп
индивидов в информационном поле. Тем самым СМИ по своему произволу активизируют одни и гасят другие колебания индивидов. Так
реализуется непрямой способ управления обществом. Предложенная
в статье модель импульсно-волнового механизма может быть полезна
для поиска путей гармонизации общества на основе переориентации
СМИ как инструмента с социального разрушения на социальное созидание. Предполагается, что переориентация может быть реализована
через активизацию рационально-ценностных колебаний в обществе
This review highlights sociological approaches to the definition and measurement of cultural consumption. Studies regarding this issue are based on the supposition that cultural preferences depend on social position and, therefore, reflect social structure. Nevertheless, despite the long history of cultural consumption research and the existence of numerous studies addressing this topic, the notion is still vague. Several approaches may be found in the literature. Cultural consumption is analyzed as a part of lifestyle that is dependent on class structure. This framework is related to the distinction between highbrow and lowbrow activities and tastes, where each set of choices is only relevant for a particular class. Criticism and further development of this approach is related to the reevaluation of both the structure of cultural consumption and the basis for distinction. More recent studies have addressed not only the symbolic value of cultural products but have also looked at the range of cultural preferences and the intensity of cultural activities. Along with this, papers tackling the modes of cultural consumption are also present. However, existing papers vary in terms of employing these approaches. On the one hand, the definitions are different; studies analyze practices, tastes, or experiences. On the other hand, researchers use different variables and scales to measure cultural consumption. © 2019 National Research University Higher School of Economics. All Rights Reserved.
Tatiana Karabchuk, Assistant Professor of the College of Humanities and Social Sciences of the United Arab Emirates University, was interviewed by Elena Berdysheva, Senior Research Fellow at the Laboratory for Studies in Economic Sociology at the National Research University Higher School of Economics, in November 2018. The interview mainly focused on Karabchuk's research interests and rich work experience at different universities around the world, emphasizing the differences in the academic infrastructures. Dr. Karabchuk highlights the shift toward international comparisons of studies in job stability, subjective well-being and happiness, and fertility and family policies. She claims that societies need to develop an understanding of how social and political institutions should be designed. Developing countries often implement social policies and practices borrowed from more developed ones. In this sense, social sciences can contribute to the process. Dr. Karabchuk also mentions the challenges for the social sciences in the UAE and her experience in launching a regular individual survey for data collection, 'Monitoring of Emirati Youth'. Research efficiency in academia as well as the development of doctoral education in the UAE were other aspects highlighted in the interview. According to her comments, many universities today provide a productive infrastructure for research, which is a crucial determinant of success. In places where the environment is enriched with material, technical, and communication resources, academics are far more productive. Flexibility in timing and 24-hour office availability for the researchers are the most encouraging factors for productive work. © 2019 National Research University Higher School of Economics. All Rights Reserved.
'Weber's Hypnosis' by HSE Professor Rostislav Kapeliushnikov [Kapeliushnikov 2018a: 25-49; Kapeliushnikov 2018b: 12-42] was a point of departure for writing this article. Answering to the examination of Weber's text by a contemporary economist, the author finds it necessary to discuss the ethical component of "The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism" in detail. The article draws special attention to the use of the ethical variable there as well as its values: the calling and the humility (also, the ressentiment). The author says that for Weber, it is important to understand where the new type of thinking comes from, the one that concentrates the entirety of life around work (e.g., business, acquisition). The pursuit of acquisition loses the religious and ethical content, but the concept of professional duty remains. According to Weber, this evolution will result in the appearance of the last man-a soulless person locked inside his profession. The author shows that Weber's interpretation of the Protestant doctrines, where the aim of work is to "get rid of the fear of damnation", is parallel to the Nietzschean idea of the unpleasant role of "the blessings of work". © 2019 National Research University Higher School of Economics. All Rights Reserved.
This paper is a polemical response to the article "Criticism of the Interview Approach in Examining the Similarity of the Appearance of Products Belonging to the Same Product Category", which also appeared in the Journal of Economic Sociology [2018, vol. 19, no 2, pp. 86-117]. In this work, Roman Bumagin and Dmitry Rogozin claim that in trademark similarity research, it is necessary to take into consideration the overall similarity of designs in the same product category. They also criticize the current research practices' focus on survey methods and call for a fundamental revision of the decision-making process on trademark similarity. While welcoming the attention given to some important subjects (e.g., the need for controls and the background level of similarity), we question the appropriateness of Bumagin and Rogozin's research procedure and draw attention to the instances of incorrect citations and the distortion of facts in their text. Using specific examples, we show that the arguments proposed in support of the criticism, in fact, illustrate the advantages of current research practices. The procedure actively uses experimental plans and considers the background level of similarity. Our article also asserts, more generally, that to criticize current decision-making in trademarks' similarity from the perspective of scientism, as Bumagin and Rogozin have done, fails to reflect the specific conditions of arbitration (in a broad sense) authorities. Their goal is not only to establish the truth but also to resolve economic conflicts, and this requires not only a strict but an understandable research procedure. We conclude that hypercriticism in trademark similarity research causes a "colonial" attitude, and it prevents real research practice improvement. © 2019 National Research University Higher School of Economics. All Rights Reserved.
This article discusses the process of constructing the image of the economic crisis in Russian online newspapers. The relevance of such analysis is due to the increasing audience attention toward economic discussions in the media during the period of economic instability and, accordingly, the increasing influence of the media on the perception of the situation in the country. This paper is based on a constructionist perspective for understanding the nature of social problems. Counter-rhetorical strategies, suggested by Ibarra and Kitsuse, are adopted to analyze the deproblematization of the economic crisis in the Russian mass media. The goal of the study was achieved by conducting a content analysis, which included the count of mentioned key words and a thematic analysis. Moreover, in order to solve one of the tasks, network analysis was used. © 2019 National Research University Higher School of Economics. All Rights Reserved.
The paper describes how the deliberate by-catch of the Caspian seals in Dagestan, Russia has given to a rise in illegal wildlife trade (IWT) in the region after the sturgeon population, as the most valuable commodity for local markets, critically declined. The data were derived from using a set of anthropological and sociological methods and approaches, including semistructured interviews (SSIs), focus groups, direct observations reflected in field notes, the life-story approach, and "grounded theory", based on a study of sturgeon poaching conducted by the author since 2012. Although the author subdivided the local IWT into four stages that cover the coastal, piedmont areas, and highlands of Dagestan, in this article, he deepens the readers' knowledge of the first two stages of IWT in the coastal areas. For a better understanding of the nature of regional IWT, the notion of an autonomous community is introduced. Several examples have been chosen for description: the inclusion of seals resulting from by-catch in new informal contractual relations between young fishers and boat owners, the illegal taking of the fishers sentenced in Kazakhstan, the ransom for the release of fishers sentenced in Kazakhstan ("Kazakh captivity"), the buying of the seals' carcasses and skins, its initial processing, and the further resale of skins to craftsmen from the mountainous areas of Dagestan. The author argues that the birth of the IWT in the regions is closely linked to the emergence of the local autonomous resource-extracting community, following the breakup of the USSR, where the Sturgeon Fishing Brigade (SFB; the first stage of IWT) and the seals' middlemen (the second stage of IWT) play the most important roles as social entities. Autonomous community helps the young fishers of the SFB to perceive illegality as an a priori phenomenon, which was facilitated by the long-term absence of the state as the main regulator of social and economic processes. Hence, there is no sense in considering the dichotomy of "legality-illegality" as a research problem when dealing with IWT as a by-product of the autonomous resource extracting community. Results also show that different types of reciprocity and redistribution serve as the main regulatory tools in conducting economic transactions among parties involved in the coastal and highlands IWT structures. The reciprocal ties are partly based on either reputation (in the case of the middlemen) a moral obligations (in the case of the SFB). © 2019 National Research University Higher School of Economics. All Rights Reserved.
Czarniawska's book may seem to be quite a challenge for several reasons: the author's trademark "crossing genre boundaries" requires a reader to pay attention and stay confident; the outward simplicity of narrating organizational change stands on sophisticated philosophical, sociological, and philological grounds; and the language is eclectic but brilliantly puts together new empirically grounded and older, well-known theoretical concepts. Czarniawska tells a story of the Swedish public sector's reorganization with the accuracy of an academic and the eloquence of a narrator-institutions become apparent in their activities, as they are based on action, which is depicted by the coined term action nets. In a sense, the reader should be attentive and "follow the words". Though imagination is also a precondition, as the light but solid and convincing narrative constructions are open to further "translation" (in a hermeneutic and actor-network sense). © 2019 National Research University Higher School of Economics. All Rights Reserved.
This book discusses the transformation of firms into platforms-companies providing software and hardware products to others-that has occurred in many economic sectors. This massive transformation resulted from switching capitalism into data, considering them as a source for economic growth and resilience. Changes in digital technologies contributed much to the relationships between companies and their workers, clients, and other capitalists, who increasingly began to rely on data. Dr. Nick Srnicek critically reviews "platform capitalism", putting new forms of the business model into the context of economic history, tracing their evolution from the long downturn of the 1970s to the economic boom of the 1990s and to the consequences of the 2008 financial crisis. The author demonstrates that the global economy was re-divided among a few of the monopolistic platforms and shows how these platforms set up new internal trends for the development of capitalism. © 2019 National Research University Higher School of Economics. All Rights Reserved.
Can Twitter data complement or supplement measures of economic confidence? This possibility was proposed in early work suggesting that sentiment surrounding the word "jobs" on Twitter closely tracked survey measures of consumer confidence. The current study uses knowledge of the processes generating Twitter data to develop and test hypotheses for when social media and survey data might align, and thus when social media processes may reflect survey measures. We expect and find the greatest correspondence when Twitter data were used to predict perceptions of recent societal economic change, rather than the aggregations of pocketbook economic experiences or reports of the state of the economy. In contrast to the concerns many scholars have raised about nonprobability data sources, the results suggest that correspondence between Twitter data and survey data did not depend on how similar Twitter users were to the population. Finally, we find evidence that the correspondences that did emerge were highly variable over time and appeared to be induced in the presence of economic volatility, suggesting that consistent long-scale trends may not be driven by consistent small-scale mechanisms.
Ours is an age of conflict at the international, regional, and local levels, as well as
between different demographic groups within different societies. The mass media—the daily newspapers, television news bulletins, magazines, and radio stories—are replete with news of these conflicts. Despite this, most of the agenda-setting studies have to date focused on the psychological effects of news media on the public.
This dissertation, however, focuses on the other side of this picture i.e., how news media bridge differences between these divergent groups and perform a consensus building role within society.
The present study is a comprehensive investigation to document the particular
effect of consensus building roles of news media in society as a consequence of the first and second levels of agenda-setting regarding corruption, terrorism, electricity, foreign policy, the economy, and health. Agenda-setting theory has established that news media not only tell us what to think about but it also tells us how to think about it. Therefore, bearing this in mind, the core thesis of this dissertation is that news media bring different divergent demographic groups in a society closer together in their perceptions of important issues and attributes of those issues.
This study, with its cross-sectional design, includes a content analysis of three leading
newspapers and three television channels, coupled with a systematic random sample survey of respondents, to explore the consensus building roles of news media among different demographic groups within the context of Pakistani society. It is an extensive replication of the previous consensus building studies (Chinag, 1995; Higgins, 2009; Lopez-Escobar, Llamas, & McCombs, 1998; Shaw & Martin, 1992) consensus building pioneer study at the first level of agenda-setting and the second level of agenda-setting among five demographic subgroups with their patterns of news media usage regarding six issues and attributes of those issues in Pakistan.
This study found that newspapers and television play a similar kind of role in bringing
divergent demographic subgroups closer together in a consensus regarding the six issues and their attributes under investigation. At the attribute consensuses building level, this study found that newspapers bring the divergent subgroups, i.e., men and women, the young and old, the rich and poor, the more educated and less educated, the politically affiliated and nonaffiliated, closer together in an agreement on the attributes of corruption, terrorism,electricity, foreign policy, the economy, and health. Television was also found to bring the segments of the populace closer together in a consensus on the attributes of these issues, while newspapers emerged from the study as having a comparatively stronger consensusbuilding role than television.
Specifically, the study revealed that the newspaper’s consensus building role among
demographic subgroups is stronger than television for the attributes of corruption, electricity, India, and Afghanistan, whereas television plays a leading role in consensus building among demographic subgroups regarding the attributes of the USA, the economy, and health. In addition, newspapers and television play a similar kind of role in bringing divergent demographic subgroups closer together in a consensus on the attributes of terrorism. Thus, the first level consensus building effects found among the Pakistani public replicate the first level consensus building effects found in the United States, Taiwan (China), and Spain, while the second level consensus building effects are congruent with those found in Spain and 15 European countries. In sum, increased news media exposure contributes to a social consensus among the divergent demographic subgroups regarding their opinion on issues and attributes of those issues.
Do economic performance and economic news coverage influence public perceptions of the economy? Efforts to assess the effects are hampered by the interrelationships among the variables. In this paper, we bring to bear a more careful accounting of available economic variables than previous studies have used. We find that both media tone and economic attitudes are strongly related to actual economic performance. Moreover, after taking into account the economy itself, a substantial relationship between media tone and economic attitudes persists. Given that economic attitudes influence a wide variety of political outcomes, this finding carries important normative and political significance.
This study develops a model that contributes to our understanding of the complex relationship between economic motivations and anti-Muslim attitudes by analyzing the underexplored role of news consumption. Using a large-scale Dutch panel dataset (n = 2694), we test a structural equation model theoretically grounded in group conflict theory, in which the relationship between news consumption and anti-Muslim attitudes is mediated by perceptions and emotions about the economy. Findings offer sound empirical support for the hypothesized model: news consumption increases pessimistic economic perceptions and negative emotions about the economy, which in turn strengthens anti-Muslim attitudes. The mechanism, however, largely depends on the type of news outlet and genre: watching television seems more decisive than reading newspapers; moreover, especially exposure to soft and popular news formats plays a dominant role.
The newspapermen studied believe they may mitigate such continual pressures as deadlines, possible libel suits, and anticipated reprimands of superiors by being able to claim that their work is "objective." This article examines three factors which help a newsman to define an "objective fact": form, content, and interorganizational relationships. It shows that in discussing content and interorganizational relationships, the newsman can only invoke his news judgment; however, he can claim objectivity by citing procedures he has followed which exemplify the formal attributes of a news history or a newspaper. For instance, the newsman can suggest that he quoted other people instead of offering his own opinions. The article suggests that "objectivity" may be seen as a strategic ritual protecting newspapermen from the risks of their trade. It asks whether other professions might not also use the term "objectivity" in the same way.
The author presents a somewhat disturbing view of current news coverage of economic events, attempts to explain why news coverage may be biased, and suggests possible strategies economists and economic educators might adopt to bring about improvement.
This paper examines the interrelationships between real-world cues, television news coverage, and public concern for the issues
of energy, inflation, and unemployment. On the basis of longitudinal data, the authors show that media agenda setting is indeed
unidirectional—television news influences public concern and not vice versa. Lead stories are significantly more powerful
than ordinary stories in shaping the public's agenda. Prevailing conditions and events affect public opinion both directly
and indirectly, by determining the degree of news coverage accorded issues.
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