Objectives. We examine how prior experience with government agencies shapes citizens' assessments of government performance. In Louisiana, two extreme weather events, 11 years apart, required intervention from the state and federal government: Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and the 2016 floods. Were Louisianans' attitudes toward government response shaped by their prior experiences during a natural disaster? Methods. We use an original survey of Louisianans to assess the role of Katrina experience in performance assessments of Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and the Louisiana state government in 2016. Results. We find a significant negative relationship: flood aid applicants in 2016 rated state government much lower, but only if they also applied for Katrina aid. Conclusions. Those with personal experience with FEMA hold lower expectations of state government performance, which deteriorated under the Jindal Administration, and look to the federal government for support. Prior experience with government agencies establishes expectations of responsibility that endure years later.
Bias accusations have eroded trust in journalism to impartially check facts. Traditionally journalists have avoided responding to such accusations, resulting in an imbalanced flow of arguments about the news media. This study tests what would happen if journalists spoke up more in defense of their profession, while simultaneously also testing effects of doing more fact checking. A five-day field experiment manipulated whether an online news portal included fact check stories and opinion pieces defending journalism. Fact checking was beneficial in terms of three democratically desirable outcomes–media trust, epistemic political efficacy, and future news use intent–only when defense of journalism stories were also present. No partisan differences were found in effects: Republicans, Democrats, and Independents were all affected alike. These results have important implications for journalistic practice as well as for theories and methods of news effects.
Today’s news media environment incentivizes gatekeeping practices that lead to a bias toward content containing partisan conflict and ideological extremity. Using a content analysis of 46,218 cable and broadcast television news transcripts from the 109th through 112th Congresses, we examined the frequency with which members of Congress appeared on cable and broadcast news. When we modelled on-air statements by members of Congress as a function of legislator and institutional characteristics, we revealed a gatekeeping function that vastly overrepresents extreme partisans on both sides of the aisle. The effect is largely consistent for network and cable outlets alike, suggesting that gatekeeping processes under both market and advocacy models bias content towards the extreme and conflictual. This finding is particularly important in light of recent evidence linking media-driven misperceptions about polarization to partisan-ideological sorting and negative political affect in the electorate.
Local newspapers can hold back the rising tide of political division in America by turning away from the partisan battles in Washington and focusing their opinion page on local issues. When a local newspaper in California dropped national politics from its opinion page, the resulting space filled with local writers and issues. We use a pre-registered analysis plan to show that after this quasi-experiment, politically engaged people did not feel as far apart from members of the opposing party, compared to those in a similar community whose newspaper did not change. While it may not cure all of the imbalances and inequities in opinion journalism, an opinion page that ignores national politics could help local newspapers push back against political polarization.
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