Understanding Media Influence and Voter Behavior in Elections

Agenda Setting

Agenda setting describes the news media's ability to influence the salience of topics on the public agenda. *Agenda-setting theory* was formally developed by Max McCombs and Donald Shaw in a study on the 1968 American presidential election. When the media focuses on just a few issues and subjects, the public tends to perceive those issues as more important.

Priming

Priming is the process in which the media attend to some issues and not others, thereby altering the standards by which people evaluate election candidates. A number of studies have demonstrated that there is a dimension of powerful media effects that goes beyond agenda-setting.

Framing

Framing is related to the agenda-setting tradition but expands the research by focusing on the essence of the issue at hand rather than on a particular topic. The basis of framing theory is that the media focuses attention on certain events and then places them within a field of meaning.

Party Affiliation

• Psychological Attachment: Parties act as perceptual filters, a framework through which you approach reality.
• Rational Response: Parties act as information shortcuts.
• Brand Loyalty: Parties act as running tallies.

Duverger's Law

Duverger's Law states that a two-party system is favored by single-member constituencies and plurality rule (the candidate who polls more votes than any other candidate is elected).

Median Voter Theorem

The Median Voter Theorem suggests that candidates compete for the support of centrist electors. In a two-party system, candidates are sure of the support of intense partisan electors; they rather compete for the center of the political spectrum. They need to mobilize and persuade lowly identified, scarcely motivated, and undecided electors. Consequently, candidates are more radical when campaigning for the primary election than in general elections.

Divergence Model

The Divergence Model posits that parties aim at mobilizing intense partisan voters.

Retrospective Voting

Retrospective voting involves assessing candidates' past performances while in office. It refers to voting made after taking into consideration factors like the performance of a political party, officeholder, and/or the administration. People are more concerned with policy outcomes than policy instruments.