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Abstract:
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In order to fully explicate the role of news media in individuals’ political participation , this dissertation aims at establishing an integrative structural model that specifies relationships among news media use , its antecedents and mediators of its influence on political participation . The proposed model is comprised of key factors of political participation that previous research has identified . The relational structure is based on models and theories relevant to prediction of political behaviors . Specifically , the model integrates (a ) communication mediation model , which posits that communication behaviors (i .e . , news media use and interpersonal discussion ) mediate the effects of socio -demographic variables (i .e . , income , education , age , gender , and race ) and political dispositions (i .e . , political interest , partisanship and ideology ) on political outcomes ; (b ) agenda -setting theory , which posits that frequent exposure to news media increases the salience of news objects in audiences’ minds ; (c ) cognitive mediation model , which posits that elaborative and collective thinking is a prerequisite to produce political outcomes of news exposure ; (d ) theory of planned behavior , which posits that human behavior can be best predicted by three proximal variables (i .e . , attitudes , subjective norms , and perceived behavioral control ) ; (e ) O -S -R -O -R (orientations -stimulus -reasoning -orientations -response ) model of communication effects , which provides a parsimonious framework of effect process . Using the structural equation modeling (SEM ) method , this dissertation analyzes the 2008 American National Election Studies data set to test the validity of the proposed structural model .
Results indicate that frequent exposure to news media stimulates attentive news use as well as intra - and interpersonal reasoning , which produce a wide range of political outcomes . Two reasoning behaviors (i .e . , self -reflection and interpersonal political discussion ) are critical mechanisms that linked news media use to various political outcomes including political participation . Personal -psychological mediators , such as strength in affects , personal traits , opinions about political issues , campaign interest , political knowledge , attitude strength , perceived ability of political parties and political efficacy all significantly mediate the influence of news media use on political participation . News media use mediates significant portion of effects that a set of preexisting variables have on political participation as well as various types of political orientations . |