Setting a Non-Agenda: Effects of a Perceived Lack of Problems in Recent News or Twitter

Abstract

The mere perception that news has given certain problems more coverage can lead the audience to assume that those problems are more important. Given that the news media, at times, obsesses over relatively trivial matters, and given that the audience is increasingly able to filter media exposure, it is worth asking what happens when audience members perceive that recent media coverage has not emphasized any very important problems. In such cases, audience members might assume that any problems facing the nation must not be particularly important. We explicate this attitude of political complacency, test whether perceived media agendas lacking important problems can influence it, and explore whether complacency helps explain political disengagement. We also explore whether these effects generalize beyond news, to new media gatekeepers such as Twitter. Two experiments tested effects of a perceived absence of important problems in recent news or Twitter content. In the case of news, but not Twitter, this increased complacency in both studies. Study 2 added a no-exposure control and found that effects on complacency were driven by the cueing of nonproblem stories, not by the absence of problem story cues. Both studies validated complacency as a predictor of political disengagement.

Notes

¹ These same two studies were also used in a separate publication addressing effects on the perceived importance of specific problems mentioned in the stimuli (Stoycheff et al., 2017). For the present purpose of testing effects on complacency, these problem importance effects serve as a manipulation check, demonstrating that participants did sufficiently attend to the stimuli.

² Institutional Review Board approval from Louisiana State University on 10/29/2013, Wayne State University on 10/17/2013, and Ohio State University on 3/29/2013.

³ Institutional Review Board approval from Louisiana State University on 3/28/2014.

⁴ Experimental factors were included as covariates in all models predicting participation and were not significant. In Study 1 models, these were the two manipulated factors of cue source and cue content. In Study 2 models, these were cue source, a dummy for problem cues, and a dummy for nonproblem cues (leaving the no-cue control condition as the missing dummy).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Raymond J. Pingree

Raymond J. Pingree (Ph.D., University of Wisconsin, 2008) is an associate professor in the Manship School of Mass Communication at Louisiana State University. His research interests include agenda setting, fact checking, and expression effects.

Elizabeth Stoycheff

Elizabeth Stoycheff (Ph.D., The Ohio State University, 2013) is an assistant professor in the Department of Communication at Wayne State University. Her research interests include new media and attitudes about democracy.

Mingxiao Sui

Mingxiao Sui (Ph.D., Louisiana State University, 2017) is an assistant professor in the Department of Media & Communication at Ferrum College. Her research interests include selective exposure, partisan media, and ethnic media.

Jason T. Peifer

Jason T. Peifer (Ph.D., Ohio State University, 2015) is an assistant professor in The Media School at Indiana University Bloomington. His research interests include political humor and perceptions of news media.