Using A Split-ballot Survey to Explore the Robustness of the 'MIP' Question in Agenda-Setting Research: A Methodological Study

Three aspects of the ‘most important problem’ questionused in agenda-setting research to measure issue salience amongthe public were examined. A split-ballot design in a state-widesurvey compared versions of the public agenda with a socialframe of reference versus a personal frame of reference, versionsusing the traditional term ‘problem’ versus ‘issue’,and the effects of question order. High correlations betweenthe different versions were found in all three sets of comparisons.     

VALUE-FRAMING ABORTION IN THE UNITED STATES: AN APPLICATION OF MEDIA SYSTEM DEPENDENCY THEORY

This paper is in the tradition of social analysis aimed at creatingframeworks to join mass media and public opinion processes (e.g.Clarke and Evans, 1983; Gamson, 1975; Gitlin, 1980; Hall, 1977;Iyengar and Kinder, 1987; Lang and Lang, 1968, 1983; Lippman,1922; Mollotch and Lester, 1974; Noelle-Neuman, 1974; Paletzand Entman, 1981; Shaw and McCombs, 1977; Turner and Paz, 1986).After a brief review of media system dependency (MSD) theory,we illustrate how it may apply to public opinion processes thatentail contested issue ‘value-frames’ (Ball-Rokeachand Rokeach, 1987). In such cases, the media system is directlyimplicated in the negotiation of legitimacy of opposing positionson an issue. Our illustrative case is the abortion issue asit has been played out in the United States over recent decades(Luker, 1984). We focus upon the respective capacities of pro-and anti-abortion movements to control the value-frame of mediacoverage of the issue (Guthrie, 1989). A value-frame may beconceived as ‘... the main substantive theme of a moralityplay’ (Ball-Rokeach and Tallman, 1979) wherein the distinctionbetween ‘good’ and ‘bad’ hangs in thebalance; in this case, between positions on abortion. We suggestthat change in the value-frame of media coverage and publicdiscourse may be understood, at least in part, as an outcomeof change in contestants' MSD relations.     

TOWARDS A NOTION OF 'WORLD OPINION'

This paper presents a content analysis of the manner in which‘world opinion’ is used in stories and editorialsof two nations' major newspapers. The authors studied the InternationalHerald Tribune and the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung for themonths of February, March, and April 1986 for articles whichcontained implicit or explicit references to ‘world opinion’.These refernces were studied using a pre-designed survey instrument,which analyzed several features of the term's usage. Topicsfor discussion included: (1) the various syonyms for world opinion;(2) the agenda for world opinion; (3) the timing of referenceto particular issues on the agenda; (4) the moral and pragmaticcomponents of world opinion; and (5) the link between worldopinion and the ‘international isolation’ of nationsor individuals. The paper concludes by combining the resultsof the study into a preliminary definition of ‘world opinion’,based upon the common usage of this term. The definition comparesthe characteristics of ‘world opinion’ and ‘publicopinion’, and discusses the possible ramifications ofunderstanding the concept in this manner.     

Katrin Doveling (2005). Emotionen--Medien--Gemeinschaft. Eine kommunikationssoziologische Analyse [Emotions--media--community. A study from the perspective of communication sociology]. Wiesbaden, Germany: VS Verlag, 340 pp., ISBN 3-531-14236-4.

‘Here is a book that makes you want to shout, "Finally!"’That is the opening sentence of a recent book review that theauthor of this review wrote for the International Journal ofPublic Opinion Research about Campaigning for Hearts and Minds:How Emotional Appeals in Political Ads Work by Ted Brader (2006).The remark refers to the fact that Brader’s book focuseson an issue that has thus far received very little attentionin the field of communication studies, or, for that matter,in the fields of political science or sociology, namely, themajor role emotions play in explaining collective behavior,social decisions, opinion formation and—especially inthe case at hand—the effects of media coverage on opinionformation. Now, in the form of Katrin Döveling’scomprehensive new     

Ted Brader (2006). Campaigns for Hearts and Minds. How Emotional Appeals in Political Ads Work. Chicago, The University of Chicago Press, 280 pp., ISBN 0-226-06989-3.

Here is a book that makes you want to shout, ‘Finally!’For decades, political scientists and communication researchershave been focusing intensively on the question of how peoplemake their final voting decision and how this decision is influencedby reporting in the mass media and campaign advertising. Nevertheless,even though there is enough literature on this subject to filla library, only very few studies have dealt with the issue ofemotional appeals in election coverage and campaign advertising—andvoters’ emotional, possibly irrational reactions to theseappeals. Although numerous findings in the fields of psychology,neuroscience, and behavioral research suggest that emotionalappeals and reactions play an important role when it comes toall kinds of decisions—which, of course, also includesvoting decisions—social researchers in the United Statesand elsewhere have,     

THE ACCESSIBILITY BIAS IN POLITICS: TELEVISION NEWS AND PUBLIC OPINION

The influence of television news over public opinion is tracedto the ‘accessibility bias’ in processing information.In general, the argument stipulates that information that canbe more easily retrieved from memory tends to dominate judgments,opinions and decisions. In the area of public affairs, moreaccessible information is information that is more frequentlyof more recently conveyed by the media. Four different manifestationsor the accessibility bias in public opinion are described includingthe effects of news coverage on issue salience, evaluationsof presidential perfomance, attributions of issue responsibility,and voting choices.     

Culture and Technological Innovation: Impact of Institutional Trust and Appreciation of Nature on Attitudes towards Food Biotechnology in the USA and Germany

Using ‘general trust in institutions’ and ‘conceptsof nature’ as examples, the article analyzes the influenceof cultural factors on sense-making of food biotechnology andthe resulting public attitudes in the USA and Germany. Accordingto the hypotheses investigated, different levels of trust andappreciation of nature explain part of the well-known differencesin attitudes between both countries. The analysis of a cross-culturalsurvey of the general population shows that appreciation ofnature is a predictor of attitudes in both countries. The higherappreciation of nature in Germany partly explains why attitudestowards food biotechnology are more negative in Germany thanin the USA. The relationship between trust and attitudes ismore complex than expected, however. Institutional trust isa moderate predictor of attitudes towards food biotechnologyin the USA but not in Germany. To explain the varying effectivenessof trust in resolving innovation-related uncertainty we referto differences in issue framing in both countries and to thehigher degree of universalism and individualism in the USA.We conclude that the higher relevance of trust and the lowerappreciation of nature make the U.S. culture more apt to assimilatetechnical innovations than the German culture.     

THE MEDIA AND ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES IN HONG KONG 1983-95

This study tests the agenda-setting hypothesis for the environmentalissue in Hong Kong from 1983 to 1995. It was found that theagenda-setting hypothesis was supported for the initial periodof five and a half years. In the subsequent period of sevenand a half years, despite the increased media coverage of theissues, there was a significant drop in the perceived salienceof the environmental problem. This may be due to the dilutionof public attention as a result of diversity in the news agendaand reporting of local environmental problems as ‘soft’news. It was also found that the environmental issue failedto compete with other prominent issues directly affecting thepublic. The mass media played a much less important role inkeeping the environmental issue on the public agenda at thelater stage.     

MEASURING THE THIRD-PERSON EFFECT OF NEWS: THE IMPACT OF QUESTION ORDER, CONTRAST AND KNOWLEDGE

This study investigated the extent to which the third-personeffect—the tendency of people to estimate greater impactof media messages on ‘other people’ than on themselves—mightdepend upon question-contrast effects (i.e. self-serving comparisonstriggered by back-to-back questions dealing with effect on othersand oneself), the order of questions, and respondents' levelsof background political knowledge. Two hundred and eighty-sevensubjects participated in two experimental studies involvingquestions about media coverage of President Clinton's possiblerole in the ‘Whitewater Affair’, his alleged frequentpolicy reversals, the O. J. Simpson murder trial, and childmolestation charges against Michael Jackson. Both experimentsresulted in significant third-person effects that did not dependupon having the same respondents answer both questions; meansfor single-question (no contrast) conditions did not differsignificantly from comparable means in two-question (contrast)conditions. No significant main effects of question order wereobserved. In Experiment 1 a significant interaction betweenpolitical knowledge and question order was found, such thata negative relationship between knowledge and perceived impacton oneself emerged when the ‘self’ question followeda question about perceived effects on others. Experiment 2 replicatedthe interaction for two of three news stimuli, and indicatedthat it was not a product of differences in the personal importanceof issues. Implications of these results for understanding thethird-person effect are discussed.     

PUBLIC APPROVAL OF ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AND OTHER NEW SOCIAL MOVEMENT GOALS IN WESTERN EUROPE AND THE UNITED STATES

The environmental movement is one of the most successful socialmovements of the twentieth century, and a key reason for itssuccess has been strong public approval of the movement's goalof environmental protection. This paper reports cross-nationaldata on public approval of environmental protection relativeto approval of the goals of other major ‘new social movements’—theanti-nuclear power movement, the nuclear disarmament movement,the women's movement, the human rights movement and the animalrights movement—in Western Europe and the United States.The data come from a 1990 ‘lifestyles and attitudes’survey conducted by Gallup for Reader's Digest, based on nationallyrepresentative samples in the United States and seventeen Europeannations, and show higher public approval for environmental protectionthan for the goals of other new social movements.     

RANDOM PROBES OF GSS QUESTIONS

Survey analysts frequently know little about the validity oftheir questions. They often have no direct evidence that respondentsunderstand the questions being posed and that shared understandingexists between the analyst and the respondent. Using the ‘randomprobe’ technique developed by Howard Schuman, about 30questions from the 1984 General Social Survey are examined.Overall there appears to be few validity problems with thesequestions, but some alternative understandings and problemsare examined. The random probes also can be used to gain substantiveinsight into the issue under investigation and their value inthis area is illustrated.     

THE GULF CRISIS: A BRITISH PERSPECTIVE

This paper presents the results of a relatively large numberof public opinion surveys conducted in Britain during the Gulfcrisis—August 1990 to February 1991—many at weeklyintervals. The questions detailed here not only dealt with publicattitudes to the crisis itself but on its impact on the perceptionof the superpowers and the Arab world; again comparative trends,stretching back for almost forty years. There is also a discussionof the Gulf crisis and the British domestic political situation—wouldthe so-called ‘Falklands effect’ of 1982-1983 bereplicated by a ‘Gulf effect’ in 1991? This collectionof surveys probably represents one of the largest databaseson the topic in Britain. The paper shows a fairly stable positionof public opinion during the crisis; an improvement in the imageof the United States but a deterioration in that of the SovietUnion; but no significant effect on the British domestic politicalscene.     

Gender Attitudes and Modernization Processes

The article aims to explain why attitudes toward gender equalityand gender relations in society vary between individuals andcountries. The hypotheses that are tested stem from two partlyconflicting theories of modernization. Wilensky (2002) advocatesa ‘structural’ explanation for variation in genderattitudes, while Inglehart (1990, 1997) suggests a ‘values’explanation. The author conducts a three-part analysis: an individual,a national, and a multilevel analysis. The structural explanationis better able to account for individual level gender attitudes.Values do, to some extent, serve as the mechanism that producesnational level variation. Inglehart (1990, 1997) is also rightin suggesting that the effect of values on gender attitudesincreases with increasing development. Received for publication August 30, 2005. Revision received December 10, 2005.     

WAPOR News

FORTHCOMING WAPOR CONFERENCES AND SEMINARS June 29–July 1, 2006: ‘Quality Criteria in SurveyResearch VI.’ WAPOR Thematic     

WAPOR News

FORTHCOMING WAPOR CONFERENCES AND SEMINARS June 26–29, 2007: ‘Communication and Elections,’Regional Seminar, Haifa     

'NO OPINION'-FILTERS: A COGNITIVE PERSPECTIVE

Research on the use of ‘no opinion’-filters suggeststhat respondents are the less likely to offer a substantiveresponse the more strongly the filter question is worded. Aseries of experiments is reported that demonstrates that filterquestions influence respondents' perception of their task: themore strongly the filter question is worded, the more respondentsassume that they will have to answer difficult questions, andthat they may not have the required knowledge. Accordingly,filter questions discourage respondents from offering globalopinions that they may hold. In line with this assumption, allrespondents who reported not having an opinion in response toa filter question, subsequently provided substantive responseson a global opinion question—presumably because the globalquestion asked was less demanding than expected on the basisof the filter. Analyses of these substantive responses indicatedthat respondents who initially reported not having an opiniondiffered from respondents who reported having one. Methodologicalimplications of these findings for the use of filter questionsand for research on the nature of ‘floating’ arediscussed.     

PUBLIC OPINION AS PARADOX: AUSTRALIAN ATTITUDES TO THE RATE OF IMMIGRATION AND THE RATE OF ASIAN IMMIGRATION, 1984-1990

Over the last few years, questions in the Australian polls aboutthe rate of immigration and the rate of Asian immigration havegenerated a remarkably wide range of response. While most ofthe polls conducted since 1984 suggest majority opposition tothe rate at which immigrants, including Asian immigrants, havebeen coming to Australia, other polls suggest majority support.Differences between the 1984 poll figures and some of the morerecent polls may reflect changes over time. Other polled differencesalmost certainly reflect differences in the way the questionswere worded. However, the most remarkable if least obvious causeof the difference seems to be the contexts in which the questionswere asked; more precisely, differences in the length and focusof the various questionnaires in which questions on immigrationwere embedded. Public opinion on the rate of immigration isnot only ‘soft’, it is created in the very attemptto measure it. Under these circumstances there is little pointin trying to isolate ‘majority opinion’ or in attemptingto establish which of the polls provides the most accurate reading.Where different readings are a product of differing contextsthey may be best understood in terms of competing conceptionsof what ‘public opinion’ itself is all about.     

THE PRO-EEC CONVERSION OF GREEK PUBLIC OPINION (1981-90)

Greece became an EEC member in 1981, following a parliamentaryvote in the then New Democracy (conservative)–controlledparliament. Opinion polls indicated though that were a referendumheld at the time, membership would have been rejected, as thegovernment had lost its popular support (and lost power in thecourse of that year) and an across-the-board anti-western majorityhad emerged in a country whose people's national identity wasfirst defined during and as a defense against the crusades.Ten years later, there exists in Greece a very large consensusin favor of EEC membership which includes even the communistleft, at least programmatically. The spectacular, and unprecedentedamong Community countries, pro-EEC conversion is the subjectof this paper. First, using the European Commission's Eurobarometerand Eurodim's Helleno-barometer data, the evolution of Greekpublic opinion towards the EEC is documented. Secondly, thetrend data in the various voting groups show that this conversionis basically the result of the transformation of the socialistelectorate from anti-EEC to pro-EEC, but with a lag behind thesimilar change in the party's (PASOK) policies during its eight-yearrule (1981–9). Thirdly, evidence is provided that anti-westernismhas not died out in Greece, but that it has both mellowed andbecome ‘selective’. So, we conclude that the pro-EECconversion was not the result of some general ‘Westernization’of Greek public opinion, but the outcome of a ‘learningexperience’: during their country's ten-year EEC membership,the Greeks discovered that the benefits from this internationalcommitment far outweighed the costs. In fact, it is argued thatthe pro-EEC conversion of Greek public opinion has contributedto the mellowing of its anti-westernism: whereas the crusadeswere instrumental in cutting the Greeks from Europe, the EECappears now the vehicle of their reintegration into a worldin whose development they have historically played a major role.     

Measuring Public Opinions About Surveys

Respondent's opinions about survey research are regarded asan expression at the individual level of the general survey-takingclimate. Based on a review of the research about ‘surveyson surveys’ five relevant dimensions of the respondent'sopinion about surveys are distinguished: survey enjoyment, surveyvalue, survey cost, survey reliability, and survey privacy.Items related to these aspects are used to develop an ‘Opinionsabout Survey Scale’. The results of an analysis of thepredictive validity of the scale support the expectations basedon the theory of planned behavior. Opinions about surveys areassociated with the intention to participate in future surveysand with hesitation to fill out the questionnaire of a mailsurvey. Opinions are not related with participation in a follow-upmail survey. The results of the wave analysis of a mail surveyare a clear indication that nonrespondents have more negativeopinions about different aspects of surveys. This also meansthat the measurement of opinions is biased. However, becauseof this bias it is worthwhile and useful to measure these opinions.