A Three-Decade Retrospective on the Hostile Media Effect

Abstract

Some 30 years ago, Vallone, Ross, and Lepper (1985) conducted a pioneering study of the hostile media effect in which they demonstrated that partisans perceive media coverage as unfairly biased against their side. Over the ensuing decades, scores of experiments and surveys have extended their findings, demonstrating hostile media effects in a variety of domains. Taking the measure of the research more than 30 years later by systematically reviewing the many studies conducted in different locales, this article summarizes the knowledge base on the hostile media effect. The article integrates findings, clarifies conceptual issues, and presents two research-based models of the effect. Future scholarly pathways are suggested, with a focus on how hostile media biases may change—or continue—in an era vastly different than the mass communication-dominated age in which the concept was pioneered.

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Notes on contributors

Richard M. Perloff

Richard M. Perloff (Ph.D., University of Wisconsin–Madison, 1978) is a professor of communication, psychology, and political science at Cleveland State University. His research interests are the third-person effect, and the psychology of persuasion and political communication.