Why Elections Are Bad News

Abstract

Beginning in 1992, news organizations adopted a more assertive posture in covering presidential elections in order to raise the level of campaign discourse. This article assesses the impact of this change in professional norms by comparing network television news coverage of the 1996 Republican presidential primaries with the speeches and paid advertisements of the candidates. A content analysis is applied to both the media and candidate messages with regard to such characteristics as the topics and issues that were addressed, the context in which policy issues were framed, and the evaluative tone of the campaign debate. We conclude that rather than raising the tone of public discourse, the media coverage contributed to the negativism and lack of substance for which the campaign was criticized. These findings raise questions about the effectiveness of reporting practices that were intended to benefit voters by assigning the media a more active role in the campaign process.

Attack Politics in Presidential Nomination Campaigns: An Examination of the Frequency and Determinants of Intermediated Negative Messages Against Opponents

“…News media outlets do not treat all candidates equally. The media give greater coverage to candidates with more perceived support, and they may not even mention candidates far back in the polls (Lichter and Smith 1996;Robinson and Sheehan 1983).9 8 It should be noted that the biases of the national news media are somewhat offset by the state news media. Previous research has demonstrated that the state news media are more likely to provide coverage of lower tier candidates than the national , news media (Haynes 1996) thus diminishing the leader bias found if one exclusively used the national media or political advertising as one's source of data.…”

Getting attention online in election coverage: Audience selectivity in the 2012 US presidential election

“…Scholars and journalists have identified four themes that account for most of campaign coverage: the horserace/strategy, issues/policies, candidates’ personality/campaign trails, and voters (Just et al, 1999; Lichter, 2001; Lichter and Smith, 1996). The present study examines the relationship between the theme of election coverage and the audience’s attention.…”