Media public affairs exposure: Issues and alternative strategies

Abstract

This study examined the reliability and stability of newspaper and television public affairs exposure; the relationship of social structural variables and media exposure, when measurement error is taken into account; and the effect of these social structural variables on change in exposure. A secondary analysis was performed on a two wave national study composed of 7201 respondents. Using a LISREL model, the results indicated that: (1) the indicators of newspaper public affairs exposure were more reliable than the indicators for television public affairs exposure; conversely, the television public affairs construct was more stable than the newspaper construct, although both yielded fairly high stability estimates; (2) various indicators of location in the social structure (age, education, income, perceived social class, and sex) had effects on exposure to newspaper and television public affairs information, and effects on the change in this type of exposure over time. It was concluded that more attention should be directed toward measurement error issues and toward operationally and theoretically defining media exposure.

Notes

Richard L. Allen is Assistant Professor of Communication, University of Michigan, and Benjamin F. Taylor is a Research Associate, New York Times. The authors gratefully acknowledge the advice provided by Leah Waks and Elise Parsigian on a draft of this article.