scholarly journals The Role of Public Broadcasting in Media Bias: Do People React Differently to Pro-government Bias in Public and Private Media?

Author(s):  
Taka-aki Asano ◽  
Atsushi Tago ◽  
Seiki Tanaka

AbstractPeople often reject new information, especially when it does not fit their prior beliefs. But do publics in advanced democracies reject information from public and private media outlets in the same way? We examine this question in the form of the media’s pro-government bias in the under-examined case of Japan. By combining unique textual data with an original survey experiment, we document that (1) people generally tend to reject pro-government biased information that overly praises government actions; but (2) the reasons why people reject the same biased information vary—based on their expectations of neutrality for public media, and on expectations derived from political ideology for private media. Our study suggests that the basis of people’s motivated reasoning differs when they evaluate content from public and private media.

Author(s):  
Andrew Kahn

Rightly appreciated as a ‘poet’s poet’, Mandelstam has been habitually read as a repository of learned allusion. Yet as Seamus Heaney observed, his work is ‘as firmly rooted in both an historical and cultural context as real as Joyce’s Ulysses or Eliot’s Waste Land’. Great lyric poets offer a cross-section of their times, and Mandelstam’s poems represent the worlds of politics, history, art, and ideas about intimacy and creativity. The interconnections between these domains and Mandelstam’s writings are the subject of this book, showing how engaged the poet was with the history, social movements, political ideology, and aesthetics of his time. The importance of the book also lies in showing how literature, no less than history and philosophy, enables readers to confront the huge upheaval in outlook that can be demanded of us; thinking with poetry is to think through the moral compromise and tension felt by individuals in public and private contexts, and to create out of art experience in itself. The book further innovates by integrating a new, comprehensive discussion of the Voronezh Notebooks, one of the supreme achievements of Russian poetry. Mandelstam’s controversial political poetry has been virtually a taboo topic (despite sporadic attempts at assessment). This book considers the full political dimension of works that explore the role of the poet as a figure positioned within society but outside the state, caught between an ideal of creative independence and a devotion to the original, ameliorative ideals of the revolution.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeremy Heyer ◽  
Nirmal Kumar Raveendranath ◽  
Khairi Reda

Narrative visualization is a popular style of data-driven storytelling. Authors use this medium to engage viewers with complex and sometimes controversial issues. A challenge for authors is to not only deliver new information, but to also overcome people’s biases and misconceptions. We study how people adjust their attitudes toward (or away from) a message experienced through a narrative visualization. In a mixed-methods analysis, we investigate whether eliciting participants’ prior beliefs, and visualizing those beliefs alongside actual data, can increase narrative persuasiveness. We find that incorporating priors does not significantly affect attitudinal change. However, participants who externalized their beliefs expressed greater surprise at the data. Their comments also indicated a greater likelihood of acquiring new information, despite the minimal change in attitude. Our results also extend prior findings, showing that visualizations are more persuasive than equivalent textual data representations for exposing con- tentious issues. We discuss the implications and outline future research directions.


2017 ◽  
Vol 27 (3) ◽  
pp. 569-615 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lina Tan ◽  
John Heath Roberts ◽  
Pamela Danvers Morrison

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate the role of consumers’ expectations and their antecedents on beliefs, attitude and behavioral intentions when they respond to new corporate social responsibility (CSR) information about a service firm. Design/methodology/approach Empirically, the authors measure prior beliefs, and then calibrate how those beliefs change in response to a piece of news. The authors develop a conceptual model articulating the nature and antecedents of three types of expectations: would, could and should. The authors use structural equation modeling to test how these expectations influence the consumer evaluation process. Findings The results show that the effect of could expectations on the evaluation process is felt via their influence on would expectations; that is, would expectations fully mediate the relationship between could expectations and attitude toward news. Similarly, attitude toward news fully mediates the relationship between would and should expectations and updated beliefs about the firm. Research limitations/implications In the selected service industry, the findings show that expectations are mediated by the new information that consumers receive when they are updating their prior beliefs. The authors demonstrate the ability to understand the antecedents of expectations, which provides a vehicle by which the organization can influence the consumer evaluation process. Practical implications In practice, managers can identify the antecedents of consumer expectations and thus influence the reference points against which those consumers will evaluate news about their product. Social implications CSR has important implications for multiple stakeholders and the authors calibrate the determinants of how news about the organization’s performance on it may affect consumer decision processes. Originality/value The paper introduces “could” expectations into the services literature, examines the antecedents of the different types of expectations, and studies how their effect is felt through the evaluation process.


2017 ◽  
Vol 71 (2) ◽  
pp. 395-407 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nichole M. Bauer ◽  
Colleen Carpinella

Existing research debates the extent to which feminine and masculine stereotypes affect voters’ impressions of female candidates. Current approaches identify how descriptions of female candidates as having feminine or masculine qualities lead voters to rely on stereotypes. We argue that extant scholarship overlooks a critical source of stereotypic information about female candidates—the role of visual information. This manuscript explores the conditions under which voters use feminine and masculine visuals to evaluate female candidates. Drawing on theories of information processing and stereotype reliance, we develop a framework that explains when visual information will affect how voters evaluate female and male candidates. We argue that visual information that is incongruent with stereotypes about a candidate’s sex will affect candidate evaluations while visuals congruent with stereotypes about candidate sex will not. We test these dynamics with an original survey experiment. We find that gender incongruent masculine visuals negatively affect evaluations of a female candidate’s issue competencies and electoral viability.


2021 ◽  
pp. 106591292110536
Author(s):  
Soonae Park ◽  
Don S. Lee

Scholars have debated the question of what influences bureaucrats’ policy implementation in provincial government, some taking the top-down and some the bottom-up approaches. However, less well understood in this debate is the impact of governors’ characteristics, particularly at a time of national political crisis. Given that their roles have been proven important for the performance of provincial governments, this is a significant oversight. To fill this gap, we examine the effect of governors’ political characteristics on provincial bureaucrats’ responses to the center by leveraging a unique setting, that of presidential impeachment in South Korea. Using original survey data on 655 civil servants from all 17 provincial governments, gathered as part of a representative survey, we find that bureaucrats are less responsive to the central government after impeachment. Our results show that this difference between pre- and post-impeachment is driven by several political characteristics, such as governors’ political ideology and tenure in office. Our findings have implications for the role of governors in intergovernmental relations and the management of provincial governments’ performance.


Author(s):  
Victor Shpak

This article is devoted to analysis of the modern problems of book publishing in the context of national information space. Development of the Ukrainian state is impossible without development of national book publishing, which is a part of its information space. In Ukraine, as one of the post-Soviet states, the formation of new information and communication system is based on its own information tradition, mentality and features of spiritual culture of the Ukrainians. It plays an important role in shaping culture, spirituality, comprehensive vision and consciousness of the nation. They were and they are a source of knowledge and the most effective way of its transfer. The transience of processes occurring the era of information society, radical socio-economic reforms, sectoral technological revolution requires the continuous scientific researches and analysis, identifying the trends in publishing industry as one of the most important factors in the state’s democratic progress. The author summarizes the development of book publishing of Ukraine and shows its role and place in the modern information society. The study of the modern book publishing is impossible without digression into the past, without finding out the roots of studying of the analysis object. The specific problems of the book industry are identified. It is concluded that in the modern Ukraine the publishing business has intensified, although the positive changes are taking place very slowly: the appropriate economic conditions for development of the publishing industry have not been created, the equipment are outdated; editorial, publishing and printing equipment of domestic manufacture are nonavailable; introduction of advanced technology are low; purchasing ability of the population is low; the sales network of printed products has been destroyed and so on. The businesses are becoming increasingly uneconomical. We propose some measures to improve this situation, strengthening the role of industry in the national information space. The key to improve the situation may be systematic and persistent efforts of the Ukrainian government to support the industry.The reason is that a comprehensive study requires from the performers not only historical knowledge, but also economic, managerial, psychological, political efforts and so on. The most important thing that the society and the state should need is the component of doctrine of information security in the context of the national security


1992 ◽  
Vol 31 (4I) ◽  
pp. 431-447
Author(s):  
Peter A. Cornelisse ◽  
Elma Van De Mortel

The severe shocks that rocked the world economy in the 1970s and the ensuing efforts to adjust and to renew economic growth have had a profound effect on the economic literature. Especially the external and public debt problems which reached critical dimensions in many countries attracted much attention. Thus, in the field of macroeconomics financial issues have gained more prominence over the last two decades. Studies relating to the fiscal deficit have been particularly numerous. The critical size of national public debts, the contribution of the public debt to external debt, the reduced confidence in the state as the guide in socioeconomic development and the role of fiscal policy in adjustment processes are among the main reasons for this increased interest.


Author(s):  
S. A. Polkhov ◽  

The article provides a Russian translation of the book IX of «Shincho̅-ko̅ ki». This part of the chronicle narrates the renewal of the war between Nobunaga and Honganji Temple. The followers of the True School of Pure Land besieged in Ozaka managed to inflict painful counterattacks against the forces of the “unifier of Japan”. Nobunaga detachments, trying to capture the Kizu fortress on the outskirts of Ozaka were surrounded and defeated. Ban Naomasa, one of his prominent military leaders, was killed, the army from Ozaka attacked the Tenno̅ji fortress, and only the help immediately rendered by Nobunaga saved the garrison from death. After that, Nobunaga blocked Ozakа on land and at sea. However, the fleet of the Mo̅ri house, which joined the ranks of Nobunaga opponents, and the allies of Mo̅ri were able to defeat the naval forces of Nobunaga and deliver provisions to Ozaka, which allowed Honganji to continue the struggle. Book IX also contains a description of the construction of Azuti Castle and its main tower (tenshu), Nobunaga’s residence. The unique information of the chronicle formed the basis for the further reconstruction of the tenshu’s appearance. The castle became the personification of the wealth and omnipotence of Nobunaga, a reflection of his claims to the role of supreme ruler of Japan. The wall paintings of the main tower halls manifest the influence of Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism. The key symbols of the images are taken from Chinese political ideology.


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