TY - JOUR
T1 - Why are "others" so polarized? : perceived political polarization and media use in 10 countries
AU - Yang, JungHwan
AU - Rojas, Hernando
AU - Wojcieszak, Magdalena
AU - Aalberg, Toril
AU - Coen, Sharon
AU - Curran, James
AU - Hayashi, Kaori
AU - Iyengar, Shanto
AU - Jones, Paul K.
AU - Mazzoleni, Gianpietro
AU - Papathanassopoulos, Stylianos
AU - Rhee, June Woong
AU - Rowe, David
AU - Soroka, Stuart
AU - Tiffen, Rodney
PY - 2016
Y1 - 2016
N2 - This study tests the associations between news media use and perceived political polarization, conceptualized as citizens' beliefs about partisan divides among major political parties. Relying on representative surveys in Canada, Colombia, Greece, India, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Norway, the United Kingdom, and the United States, we test whether perceived polarization is related to the use of television news, newspaper, radio news, and online news media. Data show that online news consumption is systematically and consistently related to perceived polarization, but not to attitude polarization, understood as individual attitude extremity. In contrast, the relationships between traditional media use and perceived and attitude polarization is mostly country dependent. An explanation of these findings based on exemplification is proposed and tested in an experimental design.
AB - This study tests the associations between news media use and perceived political polarization, conceptualized as citizens' beliefs about partisan divides among major political parties. Relying on representative surveys in Canada, Colombia, Greece, India, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Norway, the United Kingdom, and the United States, we test whether perceived polarization is related to the use of television news, newspaper, radio news, and online news media. Data show that online news consumption is systematically and consistently related to perceived polarization, but not to attitude polarization, understood as individual attitude extremity. In contrast, the relationships between traditional media use and perceived and attitude polarization is mostly country dependent. An explanation of these findings based on exemplification is proposed and tested in an experimental design.
KW - Internet
KW - mass media
KW - online journalism
KW - polarization (social sciences)
KW - political parties
UR - http://handle.uws.edu.au:8081/1959.7/uws:37807
U2 - 10.1111/jcc4.12166
DO - 10.1111/jcc4.12166
M3 - Article
SN - 1083-6101
VL - 21
SP - 349
EP - 367
JO - Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication
JF - Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication
IS - 5
ER -