Influence on American Politics
Biased media styles rooted in yellow journalism have resulted in polarization between American political parties when considering pressing issues presented by opposing sources.
Opposing News Sources
Both sources use sensational, incomplete perspectives to portray their opponent as untrustworthy, even though these techniques are the very subject of criticism, in order to increase viewership.
How People select Sources of Information
People rarely diversify their outlet of information to consider the opposing perspective.
{Allsides}
{Pew Research}
95% of people whose primary source of news came from MSNBC were Democrats
{Pew Research}
93% of people whose primary source of news came from Fox News were Republicans
Political Perspectives
“Identity [is] a filter for how we remember."
~ Hernando Rojas, University of Wisconsin-Madison Professor of Journalism
(Expand to see more from Professor Rojas)
I remember a study… looking at how people in the US remember ... the war in Vietnam, and it's interesting that what most people remember [is] not the actual newscast of the war, instead they remember ... more from entertainment than the actual news ... [and] aligned with their own political beliefs. So if you are little more on the left, then you think that horrendous atrocities were committed in Vietnam, but if you are a little more on the right, you remember the movies in which the Americans were the heroes, not the villains.”
In September 2020, Yale University conducted a social experiment assessing the impact of cross-party news exposure, with Democrats watching Fox News and Republicans viewing CNN for four weeks.
{YaleNews}
"[Republicans] who switched to CNN became more negative in their appraisals of Trump, including his management of the pandemic, his intelligence, and his honesty"
-YaleNews (Partisan media? Cable viewers shift attitudes after changing the channel)
"[Republican] participants who watched CNN were 11 percentage points less likely than the Fox News viewers to believe that it is more important for the president to focus on violent protests than the COVID-19 pandemic"
-YaleNews (Partisan media? Cable viewers shift attitudes after changing the channel)