Journalism 614 Agenda Setting and Framing Categories of

Journalism 614: Agenda Setting and Framing

Categories of Effects: ¨ 1. Agenda Setting ¨ 2. Priming ¨ 3. Cueing ¨ 4. Framing

Agenda Setting is ¨ …the process by which problems and alternative solutions gain or lose public and elite attention. ¨ …a fierce competition because we cannot consider every issue at once because the public’s “carrying capacity” is too small

Why is Agenda Setting Important? ¨ E. E. Schattschneider: ‘The definition of the alternatives is the supreme instrument of power” ¨ Control over agenda means control over outcomes ¨ Agenda setting is therefore about getting on the agenda, and about keeping things off of it.

The Foundations of a Paradigm ¨ Rejection of persuasion – Focus on cognitive processes ¨ Rediscovery of powerful effects – Response against the limited effects paradigm ¨ Interest in media--politics interface and conditions under which effects occur

Agenda Setting ¨ Agenda-setting – “telling us what to think about” (Cohen) – Identified with Mc. Combs & Shaw (1972) – Emphasis on how the media shapes public opinion concerning the relative importance of issues – Indicators of media emphasis • • • Attention (frequency and length of stories) Placement (top story, “above the fold”) Content cues (headlines, photos, tone) Number of sources / Number of outlets Others?

Four Phases of Research ¨ Hundreds of published studies – First phase - publication of Mc. Combs & Shaw’s original research - coin the term – Second phase - follow-up to confirm the effect and discover contingencies – Third phase - new domains - agenda of candidate character and personal concerns – Fourth phase - attention to the sources of the media agenda - inter-media effects

How Issues Reach the Agenda ¨ Group conflict ¨ Leadership activity ¨ Protest movements ¨ Media coverage or activity ¨ Changes in indicators ¨ Political changes ¨ Crises and Focusing Events

Special Role of Focusing Events ¨ “a rare, sudden, well-known, actually or potentially harmful event. ” – Mass Shooting, Earthquake, Govt Shutdown… ¨ Tend to induce sudden attention to issues ¨ Can trigger intensive group interest/activity ¨ Focusing events can fade fast off agenda

Studying Agenda Setting ¨ Time-order is key – Media shape public agenda? – Media follow public agenda? – Both respond to something else • Institutional prompting • Objective reality – Studies show that there is a time-ordered connection between media and public agenda • Cross-lagged correlations - arbitrary time lag • More sophisticated studies improve early methods

Major Questions ¨ Who sets the public agenda, and under what conditions is this effect likely to occur? ¨ Who sets the media agenda, and which media direct the agenda-setting process? ¨ Who sets the agendas of interest groups, leaders, and policy makers?

Contingent conditions ¨ Need for cognition/orientation – Increases agenda setting through media surveillance ¨ Political involvement/interest – Increases agenda setting through news use ¨ Issue abstraction – More pronounced for abstract issues ¨ Personal viewpoints – Increases when consistent with personal orientation ¨ Interpersonal discussion – Reduces media dependence for agenda development

Setting the media agenda ¨ Intermedia agenda setting - influence that agendas of different media have on each other ¨ Political advertising — and political elites — drive the agenda of all news organization ¨ National news agencies have been found to drive the agenda of local news agencies ¨ National newspaper have been found to drive the agenda of television networks and digital outlets

Setting the elite agenda ¨ Reciprocal causation between journalists and policy makers - both have influence ¨ Media coverage can help shape the agenda of policy-makers – However, these effects do not appear to ultimately affect policy making itself ¨ Elites pay attention to the public agenda that the media helps to establish

Problems with Agenda Setting ¨ Trouble linking evidence to key theories of society, news work, and human psychology – Often focused on aggregate level effects – shift in issue priorities across the population – and rely on incomplete psychological explanations – Failure to fully integrate content and effects in coherent studies of media effects • Limited experimental evidence

Questions about Digital Media ¨ May lessen the agenda-setting effects – More content choice – More control over content – More outlets and opinions ¨ Blogs, in particular, rely on media agenda – This may strengthen agenda setting effects

Priming (Iyengar & Kinder) ¨ Drawing attention to an issue can change the criteria used to evaluate political leaders – Issues high on the public agenda serve as basis for judging the success or failure of elites – Short-term effect or long-term effect? – Priming in politics may have profound effects • E. g. , Media attention to Persian Gulf war primes positive evaluation of Bush Presidency which reversed when focus was shifted back to the economy (Krosnick)

Priming Issues ¨ Increasing attention to effects of priming on other issues through the “spread of activation” ¨ Encountering moral-ethical issues changes how people understand other issues they encounter – Come to understand other issues in ethical terms ¨ Can also prime particular candidate characteristics – Focus on issues can prime judgments of competency or integrity, depending on the issue

Second Level Agenda-Setting ¨ Revised version of theory ¨ Media tell us how and what to think – Attention to particular attributes ¨ Sounds like framing – “to frame is to select some aspects of a perceived reality and make them more salient in a communication text” - Entman

Framing ¨ Two broad traditions – Sociological - Outcome of news work • The process of news production – Psychological - Categories of the mind • The process of audience consumption

Framing and Cueing ¨ The power of language to shape thought – Frames - broad organizing principles • Idea used to structure a news story • Journalistic decision – Cues - labels and categories • Word or phrase with rhetorical value • Contested by elites

Framing and Cueing ¨ Episodic vs. Thematic frames ¨ Strategy vs. Policy frames ¨ Ethical vs. Material frames ¨ Individual vs. Societal frames ¨ Pro-life vs. anti-abortion ¨ Estate tax vs. death tax ¨ Terrorists vs. insurgents

Episodic vs. Thematic ¨ Iyengar, 1991 – Media tend to present social problems in episodic terms (individual, short-term) instead of thematic terms (collective, long-term) – This patterns encourages audiences to attribute responsibility for solving the problem to the individual instead of the collective

Strategy vs. Policy ¨ News coverage tends to focus on the game of politics, and the competition between players, instead of the features of policy – Particularly true during elections ¨ Leads to audience cynicism and may contribute to the erosion of efficacy

Ethical vs. Material ¨ News media tend to construct issues in terms of opposing rights / moral principles, as opposed to economics or pragmatics ¨ Encourages simplified electoral decision making and character attributions

Individual vs. Societal ¨ News media tend to frame issues at the individual level, as opposed to the societal level, due to dominant news values ¨ This frame distinction interacts with other coverage elements to influence the complexity of thought, tolerance judgments

News Norms and Frame Effects ¨ These dominant news norm of focusing on specific episodes over broader themes, political strategy over policy, matters of principle over pragmatics, and individuals over groups all reduce citizen competence – What does this say about the work of journalists? How might they change?

Frames and Cognitive Processing ¨ Message frames interact with: – Audience predispositions and knowledge – Framing effects are not uniform • Different for different people ¨ Cognitive structures (schemas): – Constellations of knowledge used to organize processing of new info (e. g. , news stories) • Organized into associated networks of information • Developed through past experiences, information exposure, and social interactions

Associative Networks ¨ Networks of interrelated constructs – Frames/cues activate mental constructs ¨ Construct activation from interconnected network – Spread of activation through associated nodes ¨ Complexity of activated thoughts – Concerned with form, as opposed to content, of memory – Complexity as an indicator of political sophistication?

Model of Framing Effects

Source and Language Cues ¨ Source cues - who is making the comment? – Conservative or Liberal – Black or White – Different leaders ¨ Language cues - what labels are used? – Urban sprawl vs. Suburban development – Pro-Choice vs. Abortion Advocates – Insurgent vs. Terrorists – Alt-Right vs. White Supremacist

Powerful Cues Recast Debates ¨ Get in Groups of three to four: – Pick a set of cues that has defined the debate about a specific policy or product – Pick a policy debate or product category and discuss how the cues have defined this choice ¨ Ex. Partial Birth Abortion vs. Late Term Abortion

Frames and Cues Interact ¨ Organizing devices and source or language cues work together to influence judgment – Tolerance judgments affected by individual frame combined with “othering” cues ¨ How might they work together to influence tolerance and the desire to speak out? ¨ Get Back in Groups: Come up with an example of how a news frame and elite cue might work together to sway opinion in particular ways. – Can stick to the cue you had in mind or pick new one