Doctoral Dissertation Research in Political Science: The Influence of Competitive Elite Issue Framing on Public Opinion and Mass Partisanship

政治学博士论文研究：竞争性精英问题框架对公众舆论和群众党派之争的影响

• 批准号: 0517853
• 负责人: Edward Carmines
• 金额: $ 0.55万
• 依托单位: Indiana University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2005
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2005-08-01 至 2006-07-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0517853&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Doctoral; Dissertation; Research; Political; Science

Under what conditions can political elites influence public opinion? This dissertation research project examines the impact that issue salience and media coverage of partisan issue framing has on public opinion, mass partisanship, and issue evolution . While the power of framing has been oft-demonstrated , recent analyses suggest that when frames are pitted against each other, as they often are in news coverage, framing effects are significantly diminished. This project seeks to determine, through an experimental design and a content analysis of media coverage of several issues over time, the conditions under which partisan framing by political elites can impact public opinion and act as a mechanism that clarifies the process of mass partisan transformation. The intellectual merits and innovations of this project are (1) the extension of theories regarding the impact of framing on attitudes and public opinion to include issue salience and the partisanship of both the communicator and the receiver, (2) the creation of new data resources that will improve the ability of scholars to investigate the relationship between media coverage of issue frames and public opinion, and (3) the development of an explanatory mechanism that connects competing issue positions taken by political elites to the issue and partisanship preferences of the public. The project's content analysis examines the news media's coverage of four issues over 20-30 year periods: abortion, crime, U.S.-Iraq conflicts, and energy policy. The partisan nature of these issues has fluctuated greatly over time, providing the necessary variance to carefully determine the conditions under which public opinion changes. Coverage in The New York Times and Newsweek will be coded to determine the predominant frames used by political elites on each issue. The data will be analyzed by determining whether clear, competing, and consistent partisan frames were reported during periods that precede changes in public opinion (in both direction and overall salience) and mass partisanship. The experimental design will vary issue salience and the partisan label applied to various frames. Subjects will answer several demographic questions as well as questions that assess their opinions about ten issues: gay marriage, tax cuts, abortion, energy, social security, welfare, education, health care, gun control and crime.This research's broader impact and scientific contribution centers on the added insight this research will bring to the extant literature in political science and social psychology on the impact that partisan framing and salience have on public opinion and political partisanship. From a political science perspective, this project clarifies the conditions under which elite partisans can influence public opinion, providing the crucial link between elite partisans and mass partisans that helps explain the process of issue evolution as well as the influence of framing and the mass media on public opinion more generally. From a social psychology perspective, the project improves our understanding regarding the role of group membership on source credibility, how forewarning impacts resistance to persuasion, and the conditions under which attitude importance is strong enough to resist persuasion from credible sources.

政治精英在什么条件下可以影响舆论？本论文研究项目研究了问题的突出性和媒体对党派问题框架的报道对公众舆论、大规模党派之争和问题演变的影响。虽然框架的力量已被经常证明，但最近的分析表明，当框架相互竞争时，就像新闻报道中经常出现的那样，框架效应会显着减弱。该项目旨在通过实验设计和对媒体随时间推移对多个问题的报道进行内容分析，确定政治精英的党派框架在何种条件下可以影响公众舆论，并充当澄清大规模党派转型过程的机制。该项目的智力优点和创新在于（1）关于框架对态度和舆论影响的理论的扩展，包括问题的显着性以及传播者和接收者的党派偏见，（2）创建新的数据资源这将提高学者调查问题框架的媒体报道与公众舆论之间关系的能力，以及（3）建立一种解释机制，将政治精英所采取的相互竞争的问题立场与问题和党派偏好联系起来。公众。该项目的内容分析考察了新闻媒体在 20 至 30 年间对四个问题的报道：堕胎、犯罪、美伊冲突和能源政策。这些问题的党派性质随着时间的推移发生了很大的波动，为仔细确定公众舆论变化的条件提供了必要的差异。 《纽约时报》和《新闻周刊》的报道将被编码，以确定政治精英在每个问题上使用的主要框架。将通过确定在公众舆论（方向和整体显着性）和大规模党派之争发生变化之前的时期是否报告了清晰、竞争和一致的党派框架来分析数据。实验设计将改变问题的突出性和应用于不同框架的党派标签。受试者将回答几个人口统计问题以及评估他们对十个问题的看法的问题：同性婚姻、减税、堕胎、能源、社会保障、福利、教育、医疗保健、枪支管制和犯罪。这项研究的更广泛影响和科学贡献重点是这项研究将为政治学和社会心理学的现有文献带来关于党派框架和显着性对公众舆论和政治党派之争的影响的补充见解。从政治学的角度来看，该项目阐明了精英党派影响舆论的条件，提供了精英党派与大众党派之间的关键联系，有助于解释问题演变的过程以及框架和大众媒体对舆论的影响。更普遍的舆论。从社会心理学的角度来看，该项目提高了我们对群体成员身份对来源可信度的作用、预警如何影响对说服的抵抗力以及态度重要性足以抵抗来自可信来源的说服的条件的理解。