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？本论文的研究项目探讨的影响，问题的突出性和媒体报道的党派问题框架对公众舆论，大众党派，和问题的演变。虽然框架的力量已经被证明，但最近的分析表明，当框架相互对立时，就像新闻报道中经常发生的那样，框架效应显着减弱。该项目旨在通过实验设计和对媒体长期以来对若干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能够影响公众舆论，并作为一种机制，澄清大众党派转变的过程。该项目的学术价值和创新在于：（1）扩展了有关框架对态度和公众舆论影响的理论，以包括问题的显着性以及传播者和接受者的党派之争，（2）创建新的数据资源，这将提高学者调查媒体对问题框架的报道与公众舆论之间关系的能力，以及（3）发展一种解释机制，将政治精英采取的竞争性问题立场与公众的问题和党派偏好联系起来。该项目的内容分析研究了新闻媒体在20-30年期间对四个问题的报道：堕胎，犯罪，美国，伊拉克冲突和能源政策。这些问题的党派性质随着时间的推移有很大的波动，提供了必要的差异，以仔细确定公众舆论变化的条件。《纽约》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（在方向和整体显著性方面）和大众党派性变化之前的时期内，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党派标签适用于各种框架。受试者将回答几个人口统计学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。这项研究的更广泛的影响和科学贡献集中在增加洞察力，这项研究将带来现存的文献在政治学和社会心理学的影响，党派框架和对公众舆论和政治党派的影响。从政治学的角度来看，该项目澄清了精英党派可以影响公众舆论的条件，提供了精英党派和大众党派之间的关键联系，有助于解释问题的演变过程以及框架和大众媒体对公众舆论的影响。从社会心理学的角度来看，该项目提高了我们的理解有关的作用，群体成员来源的可信度，预警如何影响阻力说服，以及在何种条件下，态度的重要性是强大到足以抵制说服可信的来源。