Assessing the Role of Information-Processing Strategies in Learning From Local News Media About Sources of Social Capital

This study examines the mediating effects of information-processing strategies on the relationship between use of local news media, informational use of the Internet, and sources of social capital: interpersonal trust, reciprocity, and associational membership. Analyses of a telephone survey data (n = 546) of American adults show that even though local news media were influential, information-processing strategies were more powerful than attention in explaining learning from local news media about social norms at the individual level. These findings support the usefulness of the cognitive mediation model of information-processing behaviors in examining learning from local news media about social norms. Of the two strategies, elaborative processing played a more important role than active reflection in the mediating process. Informational use of the Internet had a significant and independent effect on associational membership, after demographic, structural anchoring, local media use, and information-processing measures were statistically controlled.

[1]  Colin Berry.  Learning from television news: A critique of the research , 1983 .

[2]  W. Rahn,et al.  Individual-Level Evidence for the Causes and Consequences of Social Capital , 1997 .

[3]  William P. Eveland.  The Cognitive Mediation Model of Learning From the News , 2001, Commun. Res..

[4]  Herbert J. Gans,et al.  Democracy and the news , 2003 .

[5]  R. Putnam.  The Prosperous Community: Social Capital and Public Life , 1993 .

[6]  M. W. Foley,et al.  Is It Time to Disinvest in Social Capital? , 1999, Journal of Public Policy.

[7]  Robert D. Putnam,et al.  Bowling alone: the collapse and revival of American community , 2000, CSCW '00.

[8]  E. Thorson,et al.  Associational Membership as a Source of Social Capital: Its Links to Use of Local Newspaper, Interpersonal Communication, Entertainment Media, and Volunteering , 2005 .

[9]  Dhavan V. Shah,et al.  "Connecting" and "Disconnecting" With Civic Life: Patterns of Internet Use and the Production of Social Capital , 2001 .

[10]  S. Matei,et al.  Storytelling Neighborhood Paths to Belonging in Diverse Urban Environments , 2001 .

[11]  Derek Matravers,et al.  The Cognitive Theory , 2001 .

[12]  Henry Milner.  Civic Literacy: How Informed Citizens Make Democracy Work , 2002 .

[13]  John P. Robinson,et al.  Television News and the Informed Public: An Information-Processing Approach. , 1990 .

[14]  John E. Newhagen,et al.  Revealing the Black Box: Information Processing and Media Effects , 1993 .

[15]  Freda Kemp.  Applied Multiple Regression/Correlation Analysis for the Behavioral Sciences , 2003 .

[16]  R. Petty,et al.  Mass Media Attitude Change: Implications of the Elaboration Likelihood Model of Persuasion , 2002 .

[17]  William P. Eveland,et al.  Communication and Age in Childhood Political Socialization: An Interactive Model of Political Development , 1998 .

[18]  E. Thorson,et al.  Going Beyond Exposure to Local News Media: An Information-Processing Examination of Public Perceptions of Food Safety , 2006, Journal of health communication.

[19]  Dhavan V. Shah.  Civic Engagement, Interpersonal Trust, and Television Use: An Individual-Level Assessment of Social Capital , 1998 .

[20]  Alain Degenne.  Social capital: a theory of social structure and action , 2004 .

[21]  Dhavan V. Shah, Nojin Kwak, R. Lance Holbert.  "Connecting" and "Disconnecting" With Civic Life: Patterns of Internet Use and the Production of Social Capital , 2001 .

[22]  John E. Newhagen,et al.  Why Communication Researchers Should Study the Internet: A Dialogue , 1996, J. Comput. Mediat. Commun..

[23]  A. Portes.  Social Capital: Its Origins and Applications in Modern Sociology , 1998 .

[24]  S. Chaffee,et al.  Measurement and Effects of Attention to Media News , 1986 .

[25]  J. P. Eveland.  The Effect of Political Discussion in Producing Informed Citizens: The Roles of Information, Motivation, and Elaboration , 2004 .

[26]  J. Richardson.  Handbook of Theory and Research for the Sociology of Education , 1986 .

[27]  Philip G. Cerny,et al.  Disaffected Democracies: What's Troubling the Trilateral Countries? , 2000 .

[28]  William P. Eveland.  News Information Processing as Mediator of the Relationship between Motivations and Political Knowledge , 2002 .

[29]  Pamela Paxton.  Is Social Capital Declining in the United States? A Multiple Indicator Assessment1 , 1999, American Journal of Sociology.

[30]  G Wessberg,et al.  The public trust. , 2001, Hawaii dental journal.

[31]  Karin Gwinn Wilkins,et al.  The Role of Media in Public Disengagement from Political Life , 2000 .

[32]  P. Adler,et al.  Social Capital: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly , 2009 .

[33]  W. Bennett.  News, the politics of illusion , 1983 .

[34]  Gerard Delanty.  The Foundations of Social Theory , 2009 .

[35]  N. Lin.  Social Capital: Frontmatter , 2001 .

[36]  P. Bourdieu.  Forms of Capital , 2002 .

[37]  Shirley A. Star,et al.  AMERICAN ASSOCIATION FOR PUBLIC OPINION RESEARCH , 1980 .

[38]  A. Bandura.  Social Cognitive Theory of Mass Communication , 2001 .

[39]  K. Newton.  Social Capital and Democracy , 1997 .

[40]  Elazar J. Pedhazur,et al.  Measurement, Design, and Analysis: An Integrated Approach , 1994 .

[41]  R. Putnam.  Bowling Alone: America's Declining Social Capital , 1995, The City Reader.

[42]  Eric L. Lesser.  Knowledge and Social Capital: Foundations and Applications , 2000 .

[43]  D. Graber,et al.  Mass media and American politics , 1980 .

[44]  R. Putnam.  Tuning In, Tuning Out: The Strange Disappearance of Social Capital in America , 1995, PS: Political Science & Politics.

[45]  E. Perse.  Media involvement and local news effects , 1990 .

[46]  Scott L. Althaus,et al.  Please Scroll down for Article Political Communication Patterns of Internet and Traditional News Media Use in a Networked Community Patterns of Internet and Traditional News Media Use in a Networked Community , 2022 .

[47]  E. Uslaner.  Trust, Civic Engagement, and the Internet , 2004 .

[48]  Dietram A. Scheufele,et al.  Community, Communication, and Participation: The Role of Mass Media and Interpersonal Discussion in Local Political Participation , 1999 .

[49]  Jennings Bryant,et al.  The Effect of Positioning a Message within Differentially Cognitively Involving Portions of a Television Segment on Recall of the Message , 1978 .

[50]  M. Woolcock.  Social capital and economic development: Toward a theoretical synthesis and policy framework , 1998 .

[51]  K. Newton.  Trust, Social Capital, Civil Society, and Democracy , 2001 .

[52]  William P. Eveland.  A “Mix of Attributes” Approach to the Study of Media Effects and New Communication Technologies , 2003 .

[53]  J. Coleman,et al.  Social Capital in the Creation of Human Capital , 1988, American Journal of Sociology.

[54]  P. Norris.  Does Television Erode Social Capital? A Reply to Putnam , 1996, PS: Political Science & Politics.

[55]  Gerald M. Kosicki,et al.  Cognitive strategies for media use during a presidential campaign , 1996 .

[56]  S. Raudenbush,et al.  Neighborhoods and violent crime: a multilevel study of collective efficacy. , 1997, Science.