Revisiting the Knowledge Gap Hypothesis: A Meta-Analysis of Thirty-Five Years of Research

Abstract

This kriowledge gap meta-analysis examines (a) average effect size of the gap, (b) impact of media publicity, and (c) moderators of thc gap. Positive correlation between education and leuel of knowledge (r = .28) was found, uiith no differences in the size of the gap (a) over time and (b) between issues of higher and lower publicity. However, gap magnitude was rnoderated by topic, setting, knowledge measure, and study design, but not by publication status, country, and sampling method. Relatively smaller gaps were found for (a) health-science topics compared to social-political topics and (b) local/personal issues compared to international issues. ~~~ ~ ~~~Because social power is often based on knowledge, relative dispossession of knowledge may lead to relative deprivation of power.' The knowledge gap hypothesis proposes that the media can increase gaps in knowledge, predicting, "As the infusion of mass media information into a social system increases, segments of the population with higher socioeconomic status tend to acquire this information at a faster rate than the lower status segments so that the gap in knowledge between these segments tends to increase rather than decrease."2 This hypothesis produced a considerable body of research and stimulated an active debate about the existence and nature of a socially structured knowledge gap. Although more than one hundred studies have examined the knowledge gap,3 relatively few studies have synthesized the knowledge gap literature, though there are three narrative reviews that summarize the knowledge gap l i t e r a t~r e .~ A narrative review can be misleading because it reviews previous works by aggregating results of significance tests without systematic decision rules and procedures.' A meta-analytic review attempts to avoid this problem by addressing effect sizes rather than statistically significant results.This present study, a meta-analysis providing a systematic summary of previous research on the knowledge gap hypothesis, has three specific goals: (a) to obtain an average size for the knowledge gap, (b) to examine the impact of media publicity on the knowledge J&MC Q Yoori Hroang is a Ph.D. candidate in the School offournalisn~ and Mass Communication at the University ofMinnesota, and Se-Hoon feong is an assistant professor in the School offournalism and Mass Communication at Korea University.

Closing Gaps in International Knowledge and Participation: News Attention, Online Expression, and the 2010 Haiti Earthquake

“…In fact, the news setting in which SES gaps have been found to be the widest is in the acquisition of information about international news (Hwang & Jeong, 2009). This disparity is not surprising in light of the theoretical underpinnings of the knowledge gap.…”

Political communication in a high-choice media environment: a challenge for democracy?

“…The core of the concern is that increasing media choice will lead to increasing inequalities in the extent to which people make use of the news media, and that this will result in increasing inequalities in knowledge about politics and current affairs among different groups in society Blekesaune et al, 2012;Eveland & Scheufele, 2000;Gaziano, 2010;Hwang & Jeong, 2009;Ksiazek et al, 2010;Strömbäck et al, 2013;Wei & Hindman, 2011). Thus, the concern is rooted in how changes in the supply of news and other political information influence the demand and, subsequently, learning about politics and current affairs.…”

Transmission creep

“…A quarter century later, another meta-analysis confirmed that the knowledge gap effect was murkier than initially proposed (Hwang and Jeong 2009). As early as 1980, Dervin was on to one likely reason why.…”

“…For instance, a 1976 study found (with caveats about other relevant factors) that watching televised presidential debates seemed to widen existing information gaps between knowledge-rich and knowledge-poor citizens (Bishop, Oldendick, and Tuchfarber 1978). Clear evidence of a health-related knowledge gap has been more elusive, perhaps because of nearly universal interest in health (Hwang and Jeong 2009).…”