Speaking Up and Silencing Out in Face of a Changing Climate of Opinion

Abstract

This paper relies on panel data from Israel to test the spiral of silence the0 y ' s assumptions concerning overt expression of opinion. The research design provides a way to examine the effect of a changing climate of opinion on who speaks up and who silences out over time and changing circumstances. In addition, a multivariateapproach is adopted to test the role of climate perceptions relative to other factors, and extend our understanding of public speech. Perceptions of the climate of opinion are found to be related to overt expression of opinion cross-sectionally; however, their impact is not consistent and weaker than other factors. General political involvement is most important, and also various sociodemographic characteristics of people are more powerful than climate perceptions. Over time this relationship does not hold, and the paper focuses on political discontent and value expression considerations.

News, Talk, Opinion, Participation: The Part Played by Conversation in Deliberative Democracy

“…And education is not always positively associated with willingness to argue. Shamir (1997), for example, also found that education was negatively associated with people's willingness to express opinion on a controversial issue to a stranger who disagrees with them in a long bus ride.…”

Expressing Opinions about the Refugee Crisis in Europe: The Spiral of Silence and Crisis Communication

“…Even so, there have been many suggestions about how to measure the opinion climate. Some have asked about the opinion among the general public (Shamir, 1997), while others have focused on different reference groups (Moy, Domke, & Stamm, 2001;Oshagan, 1996). An interesting and maybe also troublesome aspect in previous research is the lack of mass media indicators in many studies.…”

“…A few studies have used panel data. Shamir (1997) used a two-wave panel to investigate the spiral of silence and climate change, and McDonald, Glynn, Kim, and Ostman (2001) used a fourwave panel from 1948 and conducted a secondary analysis on opinion climate and candidate preference.…”

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“…Even so, there have been many suggestions about how to measure the opinion climate. Some have asked about the opinion among the general public (Shamir, 1997), while others have focused on different reference groups (Moy, Domke, & Stamm, 2001;Oshagan, 1996). An interesting and maybe also troublesome aspect in previous research is the lack of mass media indicators in many studies.…”

“…A few studies have used panel data. Shamir (1997) used a two-wave panel to investigate the spiral of silence and climate change, and McDonald, Glynn, Kim, and Ostman (2001) used a fourwave panel from 1948 and conducted a secondary analysis on opinion climate and candidate preference.…”