News and Public Opinion: Media Effects on Civic Life

The daily news plays a major role in the continuously changing mix of thoughts, feelings and behavior that defines public opinion. The News & Public Opinion details these effects of the news media on the sequence of outcomes that collectively shape public opinion, beginning with initial attention to the various news media and their contents and extending to the effects of this exposure on the acquisition of information, formation of attitudes and opinions and to the consequences of all these elements for participation in public life. Sometimes called the hierarchy of media effects, this sequence of outcomes describes the communication process involved in the formation of public opinion.

Although the media landscape is undergoing rapid change, key elements remain the same, and The News & Public Opinion emphasizes these basic principles of communication established over decades of empirical social science investigations into the impact of mass communication on public opinion. The primary audience for this book is students, both advanced undergraduates and graduate students, as well as members of the general public who want to understand the role of the news media in our civic life.

INTRODUCTION
Chapter 1. What Is Public Opinion?

PART ONE: THE NEWS MEDIA
Chapter 2. A Changing Communication Environment
Chapter 3. Reporting the News
Chapter 4. Trust in the News

PART TWO: SETTING THE CIVIC STAGE
Chapter 5. The Audiences for News
Chapter 6. Focusing Public Attention
Chapter 7. Learning from the News
Chapter 8. Forming Opinions
Chapter 9. Tone of the News
Chapter 10. Political Behavior
Chapter 11. What Citizens Bring to the News
Chapter 12. News Influence on Civic Life

PART THREE: COMING TO JUDGMENT
Chapter 13. Assessing the Role of News in Civic Life

Bibliography
Index

Max McCombs is Jesse H. Jones Centennial Chair in Communication at the School of Journalism, University of Texas at Austin

R. Lance Holbert is Associate Professor and Director of Graduate Studies at the School of Communication, Ohio State University

Spiro Kiousis is Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Public Relations, University of Florida

Wayne Wanta is Professor and Chair of the Department of Journalism, University of Florida