The Discipline's Debate Contributions: Then, Now, and Next

Abstract

After arguing that our disciplinary origins and aptitudes equip us to understand the practice and potential of political debate, this essay will synthesize briefly some of the contributions our scholarship has made to understanding televised presidential debates, telegraph some major findings about three topics—learning from debates, factors that mediate audience response, and the ways in which candidate debate communication forecasts the presidency of the eventual winner—and will then note questions about each of these three areas that invite additional inquiry.

Keywords:

• Presidential Debates
• Debate Learning
• Debate Effects

Notes

1 James M. O'Neill, “A Disconcerted Editor and Others,” Quarterly Journal of Public Speaking 1, no. 1 (1915): 81.

2 Edwin Shurter, How to Debate (New York, NY: Harper and Brothers Publishers, 1917), 5.

3 William Foster, Debating for Boys (New York, NY: The Macmillan Company, 1922), 3.

4 Albert Baird, Argumentation, Discussion and Debate (New York, NY: McGraw-Hill, 1950), 309–10.

5 Austin J. Freeley, Argumentation and Debate: Rational Decision Making (San Francisco, CA: Wadsworth Publishing, 1957), 3.

6 Freeley, Argumentation and Debate, 4.

7 See, for example, David Zarefsky, “The Lincoln–Douglas Debates Revisited: The Evolution of Public Argument,” Quarterly Journal of Speech 72, no. 2 (1986): 162–84; David Zarefsky, Lincoln, Douglas, and Slavery: In the Crucible of Public Debate (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1993); Kirt Wilson, “The Contested Space of Prudence in the 1874–1875 Civil Rights Debate,” Quarterly Journal of Speech 84, no. 2 (1998): 131–49; Kirt Wilson, The Reconstruction Desegregation Debate: The Politics of Equality and Rhetoric of Place, 1870–1875 (East Lansing, MI: Michigan State University Press, 2002).

8 Austin J. Freeley, “The Presidential Debates and the Speech Profession,” Quarterly Journal of Speech 47, no. 1 (1961): 61.

9 The Racine Group, “White Paper on Televised Political Campaign Debates,” Argumentation and Advocacy 38, no. 4 (2002): 203.

10 Sidney Kraus, ed. The Great Debates: Kennedy vs. Nixon, 1960 (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1962), 15.

11 David Sears and Richard Whitney, “Political Persuasion” in Handbook of Communication, eds. Ithiel de Sola Pool et al. (Chicago, IL: Rand McNally College Publishing, 1973), 268, emphasis added.

12 Steven Chaffee, “Presidential Debates—Are They Helpful to Voters?” Communication Monographs 45, no. 4 (1978): 330–46.

13 See, for example, Mitchell McKinney and Diana Carlin, “Political Campaign Debates,” in Handbook of Political Communication Research, ed. Lynda Lee Kaid (Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 2004), 211.

14 See Kathleen H. Jamieson and David Birdsell, Presidential Debates: The Challenge of Creating an Informed Electorate (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1988); Alan Schroeder, Presidential Debates (New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 2001).

15 Lloyd Bitzer and Theodore Rueter, Carter Versus Ford: The Counterfeit Debates of 1976 (Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 1980).

16 William Benoit, Mitchell McKinney, and R. Lance Holbert, “Beyond Learning and Persona: Extending the Scope of Presidential Debate Effects,” Communication Monographs 68, no. 3 (2001): 259–73.

17 Robert Friedenberg, ed. Rhetorical Studies of National Political Debates: 1960–1992, 2nd edition (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1994).

18 Jian-Hua Zhu, J. Ronald Milavsky, and Rahul Biswas, “Do Televised Debates Affect Image Perception More Than Issue Knowledge? A Study of the First 1992 Presidential Debate,” Human Communication Research 20, no. 3 (1994): 302–33.

19 See, for example, William Benoit and Allison Harthcock, “Functions of the Great Debates: Acclaims, Attacks, and Defense in the 1960 Presidential Debates,” Communication Monographs 66, no. 4 (1999): 341–57.

20 See, for example, Bitzer and Rueter, Carter Versus Ford; Patricia Riley and Thomas Hollihan, “The 1980 Presidential Debates: A Content Analysis of the Issues and Arguments,” Speaker and Gavel 18, no. 2 (1981): 47–59; David Levasseur and Kevin Dean, “The Use of Evidence in Presidential Debates: A Study of Evidence Levels and Types from 1960 to 1988,” Argumentation and Advocacy 32, no. 3 (1996): 129–42.

21 Diana Carlin, “Presidential Debates as Focal Points for Campaign Arguments,” Political Communication 9, no. 4 (1992): 251–65.

22 Edward Hinck, Enacting the Presidency: Political Argument, Presidential Debates, and Presidential Character (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1993).

23 Roderick Hart, and Sharon Jarvis, “Political Debate Forms, Styles, and Media,” American Behavioral Scientist 40, no. 8 (1997): 1095–122.

24 The Racine Group, “White Paper on Televised Political Campaign Debates,” Argumentation and Advocacy 38, no. 4 (2002): 199–218. See also Mitchell McKinney and Diana Carlin, “Political Campaign Debates,” in Handbook of Political Communication Research, ed. Lynda Lee Kaid (Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 2004), 203–34.

25 Sidney Kraus and Dennis Davis, “Political Debates,” in Handbook of Political Communication, eds. Dan Nimmo and Keith Sanders (Beverly Hills, CA: Sage, 1981), 280.

26 Mitchell McKinney and Diana Carlin, “Political Campaign Debates,” in Handbook of Political Communication Research, ed. Lynda Lee Kaid (Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 2004), 204.

27 The Racine Group, “White Paper,” 202–3.

28 Elihu Katz and Jacob Feldman, “The Debates in the Light of Research: A Survey of Surveys,” In The Great Debates: Kennedy vs Nixon, 1960, ed. Sidney S. Kraus (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1962) 173–223. See also Chaffee, “Presidential Debates,” 330–46; David Sears and Steven Chaffee, “Uses and Effects of the 1976 Debates: An Overview of Empirical Studies,” In The Great Debates: Carter vs. Ford, 1976, ed. Sidney Kraus (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1979), 223–61; Kathleen H. Jamieson and Christopher Adasiewicz, “What Can Voters Learn From Election Debates?” In Televised Election Debates: International Perspectives, ed. Stephen Coleman (New York, NY: St. Martin's Press, 2000), 25–42; William Benoit and Glenn Hansen, “Presidential Debate Watching, Issue Knowledge, Character Evaluation, and Vote Choice,” Human Communication Research 30, no. 1 (2004): 121–44.

29 William Benoit, Glenn Hansen, and Rebecca Verser, “A Meta-Analysis of the Effects of Viewing U.S. Presidential Debates,” Communication Monographs 70, no. 4 (2003): 335–50.

30 Markus Prior, “Who Watches Presidential Debates? Measurement Problems in Campaign Effects Research,” Public Opinion Quarterly 76, no. 2 (2012): 350.

31 Markus Prior and Arthur Lupia, “Money, Time, and Political Knowledge: Distinguishing Quick Recall and Political Learning Skills,” American Journal of Political Science 52, no. 1 (2008): 169–83.

32 Prior, “Who Watches,” 350.

33 See Benoit and Hansen, “Presidential Debate Watching”; Kim Fridkin et al., “Capturing the Power of a Campaign Event: The 2004 Presidential Debate in Tempe,” The Journal of Politics 69, no. 3 (2007): 770–85; R. Lance Holbert, “Debate Viewing as Mediator and Partisan Reinforcement in the Relationship Between News Use and Vote Choice,” Journal of Communication 55, no. 1 (2005): 85–102.

34 See Matthew Baum and Samuel Kernell, “Has Cable Ended the Golden Age of Presidential Television?” American Political Science Review 93, no. 1 (1999): 99–114; see also Kate Kenski and Natalie Jomini Stroud, “Who Watches Presidential Debates? A Comparative Analysis of Presidential Debate Viewing in 2000 and 2004,” American Behavioral Scientist 49, no. 2 (2005): 213–28.

35 See, for example, Richard Johnston, Michael Hagen and Kathleen Hall Jamieson, The 2000 Election and the Foundations of Party Politics (New York, NY: Cambridge University Press, 2004); Kate Kenski, Bruce Hardy and Kathleen Hall Jamieson, The Obama Victory: How Media, Money, and Message Shaped the 2008 Election (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2010).

36 Nielsen Company, General Election Debates: 1960–2012 Viewing Data (Commissioned study by the Annenberg Public Policy Center, Philadelphia—November 6, 2013).

37 Kate Kenski, “Testing Political Knowledge: Should Knowledge Questions Use Two Response Categories or Four?” International Journal of Public Opinion Research 15, no. 2 (2003):192–200.

38 Johnston, Hagen and Jamieson, The 2000 Election, 168.

39 John Zaller, “A Review of: ‘Bush Beats Gore in Good Economy: It Was the Campaign, Stupid,’” Political Communication 22, no. 4 (2005): 533.

40 Zaller, “A Review,” 536.

41 Diana Mutz and Byron Reeves, “The New Videomalaise: Effects of Televised Incivility on Political Trust,” American Political Science Review 99, no. 1 (2005): 1–15.

42 Diana Mutz and R. Andrew Holbrook, “Televised Political Conflict: Nemesis or Necessity?” (Paper, Annual Convention of the Midwest Political Science Association, Chicago, April 2003). See also Dietram Scheufele, Eunkyung Kim, and Dominique Brossard, “My Friend's Enemy: How Split-Screen Debate Coverage Influences Evaluation of Presidential Debates,” Communication Research 34, no. 1 (2007): 3–24.

43 Hans Kepplinger and Wolfgang Donsbach, “The Influence of Camera Perspective on the Perception of a Politician by Supporters, Opponents and Neutral Viewers,” in Political Communication Research: Approaches, Studies, Assessments, ed. David Paletz (Norwood, NJ: Ablex, 1987), 62–72.

44 Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, “One-In-Ten ‘Dual Screened’ the Presidential Debate,” October 11, 2012, http://www.people-press.org/2012/10/11/one-in-ten-dual-screened-the-presidential-debate/.

45 J. Brian Houston et al., “Tweeting During Presidential Debates: Effect on Candidate Evaluations and Debate Attitudes,” Argumentation & Advocacy 49, no. 4 (2013): 302–12.

46 Jeffrey Gottfried, Bruce Hardy, Ken Winneg, and Kathleen Hall Jamieson, “Social Networking Sites and Knowledge of the 2012 Presidential Election,” (Paper, Annual Convention of the National Communication Association, Washington, D.C., November 21–24, 2013).

47 R. Lance Holbert, “Debate Viewing as Mediator and Partisan Reinforcement in the Relationship Between News Use and Vote Choice,” Journal of Communication 55, no. 1 (2005): 85–102.

48 For research work suggesting debate viewing reduces cynicism see Mitchell McKinney and Benjamin Warner, “Do Presidential Debates Matter? Examining a Decade of Campaign Debate Effects,” Argumentation & Advocacy 49, no. 4 (2013): 250–51

49 Steven Chaffee and Jack Dennis, “Presidential Debates: An Empirical Assessment,” In The Past and Future of Presidential Debates, ed. Austin Ranney (Washington, D.C.: American Enterprise Institute, 1979), 85.

50 Gladys Lang and Kurt Lang, “The Formation of Public Opinion: Direct and Mediated Effects of the First Debate,” in The Presidential Debates: Media, Electoral, and Policy Perspectives, eds. George Bishop, Robert Meadow, and Marilyn Jackson-Beeck (New York, NY: Praeger, 1978), 61–80.

51 Frederick Steeper, “Public Response to Gerald Ford's statements on Eastern Europe in the Second Debate,” In The Presidential Debates: Media, Electoral, and Policy Perspectives, eds. George Bishop, Robert Meadow, and Marilyn Jackson-Beeck (New York, NY: Praeger, 1978), 81–101.

52 Sears and Chaffee, “Uses and Effects.”

53 Lori McKinnon, John Tedesco, and Lynda Kaid, “The Third 1992 Presidential Debate: Channel and Commentary Effects,” Argumentation and Advocacy 30, no. 2 (1993): 106–18.

54 Lori McKinnon and John Tedesco, “The Influence of Medium and Media Commentary on Presidential Debate Effects,” In The Electronic Election: Perspectives on the 1996 Campaign Communication, eds. Lynda Lee Kaid and Dianne Bystrom (Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum, 1999), 191–206.

55 Kathleen H. Jamieson and Paul Waldman, The Press Effect: Politicians, Journalists, and the Stories that Shape the Political World (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2003).

56 Dennis Lowry, Janet Bridges, and Paul Barefield, “Effects of TV Instant Analysis and Querulous Criticism—Following the First Bush–Dukakis Debate,” Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly 67, no. 4 (1990): 814–25.

57 Kathleen H. Jamieson, ed. Electing the President 2012: The Insiders’ View (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2013).

58 Hinck, Enacting the Presidency.

59 David Zarefsky, “Spectator Politics and the Revival of Public Argument,” Communication Monographs 59, no. 4 (1992): 412.

60 Mark Goodman, Mark Gring, and Brian Anderson, “The Visual Byte: Bill Clinton and His Town Hall Meeting Style,” Journal of Communication 1, no. 1 (2007). Retrieved from http://www.scientificjournals.org/journals2007/articles/1014.htm.

61 Sidney Kraus, Televised Presidential Debates and Public Policy (Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1988).

62 See, for example, Susan Lederman and Gerald M. Pomper, Elections in America: Control and Influence in Democratic Politics (New York, NY: Longman, 1980); Michael Krukones, Promises and Performance: Presidential Campaigns as Policy Predictors. (Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1984); Jeff Fishel, Presidents and Promises: From Campaign Pledge to Presidential Performance (Washington, D.C.: CQ Press, 1985).

63 Jamieson and Birdsell, Presidential Debates. See also Kathleen Hall Jamieson, “Do Good Debaters Make Good Presidents? Personality Revealed,” The New York Times (New York, October 23, 2011) http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2011/10/23/do-good-debaters-make-good-presidents/in-presidential-debates-personality-is-revealed.

64 Nelson Polsby, “Debatable Thoughts on Presidential Debates,” in The Past and Future of Presidential Debates, ed. Austin Ranney (Washington, D.C.: American Enterprise Institute Press, 1979), 179.