News media strongly influence how we picture public affairs across the world, playing a significant and sometimes controversial role in determining which topics are at the centre of public attention and action. Setting the Agenda, first published in 2004, has become the go-to textbook on this crucial topic.
In this timely third edition, Maxwell McCombs - a pioneer of agenda-setting research - and Sebastián Valenzuela - a senior scholar of agenda setting in Latin America - have expanded and updated the book for a new generation of students. In describing the media's influence on what we think about and how we think about it, Setting the Agenda also examines the sources of media agendas, the psychological explanation for their impact on the public agenda, and their consequences for attitudes, opinions and behaviours. New to this edition is a discussion of agenda setting in the widened media landscape, including a full chapter on network agenda setting and a lengthened presentation on agenda melding. The book also contains expanded material on social media and the role of agenda setting beyond the realm of public affairs, as well as a foreword from Donald L. Shaw and David H. Weaver, the co-founders of agenda-setting theory.
This exciting new edition is an invaluable source for students of media, communications and politics, as well as those interested in the role of news in shaping and directing public opinion.Table of Contents
Foreword: ‘Messages and Residues’ Donald L. Shaw and David H. WeaverPreface
Notes
1 Influencing Public Opinion
Our pictures of the world
Contemporary empirical evidence
The accumulated evidence
The 1972 US presidential election in Charlotte
The 1976 US presidential election in three communities
National concern about civil rights
British and American concern about foreign affairs
Public opinion in Germany
Agenda setting in a Swedish election
Public opinion in Louisville
Local public opinion in Spain, Japan, and Argentina
Replication with other issues
Cause and effect
A new communication landscape
1. Do online media have agenda-setting effects among the public?
2. Has the proliferation of online media diminished the agenda-setting impact of the traditional media?
3. To what extent are there specific channel effects vs. the collective impact of a communication gestalt?
Summing up
Notes
2 Reality and the News
Idiosyncratic pictures
A decade of American public opinion
Creating a crisis
National concern about drugs
Fear of crime
Discovering the environment
Alarmed discovery
Perspectives on agenda-setting effects
Content versus exposure
Agenda setting in past centuries
Summing up
Notes
3 The Pictures in our Heads
Pictures of political candidates
Candidate images in national elections
Candidate images in local elections
Visual images and attributes
Attributes of issues
Compelling arguments
Agenda setting and other communication theories
Attribute agenda setting and framing
Summing up
Notes
4 Networks of Issues and Attributes
Associative memory
Networks of candidates and attributes
Accumulated evidence on network agenda setting
A new gestalt perspective
Summing Up
Notes
5 Why Agenda Setting Occurs
Relevance and uncertainty
Occurrence of agenda-setting effects
Relevance
Personal experience with public issues
Individual differences
Incidental learning
Agenda-melding
Summing up
Notes
6 How Agenda Setting Works
Carrying capacity of the public agenda
Diversity and volatility of the public agenda
Education and agenda setting
Explaining the transfer of salience
Timeframe for effects
Diversity of salience measures
Summing up
Notes
7 Shaping the Media Agenda
The president and the national agenda
Subsidizing the media agenda
Capturing the media agenda
Three election agendas
Media agendas in local elections
Attributes of local issues
Three elements of elections
A broader portrait
Intermedia agenda setting
Summing up
Notes
8 Consequences of Agenda Setting
Priming public opinion
Attribute agendas and opinions
Forming opinions
Influencing behaviour
Agenda setting role of business news
Summing up
Notes
9 Communication and Society
Transmission of culture
New agenda-setting arenas
Other cultural agendas
Concepts, domains, and settings
Continuing evolution of agenda-setting theory
Notes
Bibliography
Index
