All of this Ebola uproar takes me back to a little research piece I wrote my senior year of my undergrad at UM-F. Thanks to the media, we're in prime agenda setting theory overload. I'll share with you snippet of the paper below, you can quickly paint a visual of what's happening right now in society with the Ebola scare and what may be getting swept under the rug because of it. The CDC and other experts predict that more people in the U.S. will die in the next year of influenza or perhaps more alerting and something that's not being exploited as much as Ebola, the Enterovirus which has already taken 600+ lives whereas Ebola has taken the life of one individual and infected less than a handful of people since here in the U.S. So why is it we're focusing all of our time an energy on Ebola instead of some of the more alarming statistics of other health risks out there? Welcome to agenda setting theory, enjoy.
http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/dont-forget-flu
The mass media has a profound
effect on today’s society. Citizens are
being pushed, pulled and pointed in every which direction as to what’s deemed
“newsworthy” or relevant from every such existing medium. The media has a strikingly effective way of
presenting ideas, offering opinions and ultimately setting the agenda as to
what’s relevant. “Water cooler” talk has drastically changed over the years to expand
beyond the once important, life-altering news stories, to reflect a staggering
number of political propaganda, continuous fiscal woes and the increasing
phenomenon of seemingly irrelevant entertainment headlines. In an effort to highlight the inequalities
and influence passed on from the media’s agenda to public agenda, we’ll examine
the agenda-setting theory and its involvement in media studies and its effect
on society’s health and well-being issues.
Agenda-setting theory
was popularized by researcher’s Maxwell McCombs and Donald Shaw in 1972.
McCombs and Shaw were interested in the overwhelming influence of mass medias
“…ability to transfer the salience of issues on their news agenda to public
agenda” ( Griffin ). Adding,
society looks to media as to where their focus should be placed and why; “media
assistance.” They note “We judge as important what the media judge as
important,” - a statement that certainly drives home the agenda-setting
hypothesis.
In an effort to
best understand the agenda-setting theory, it’s important to look at some of
the components of the theory. First and foremost, the theory can be identified
as an objective approach. Essentially, the theory looks to uncover one truth,
answering what is real. With conducting
experiments, focusing on unbiased observations and practical utility, we
uncover what we already know and eventually can decipher what is good.
Furthermore, the
theory is also noted as a socio-psychological tradition of communication
studies. The tradition is based on interpersonal interaction, expression and
influence. The problem within the communication lies within a situation that
requires manipulation or perception, whether cognitively speaking or not. The
socio-psychological tradition focuses on cause and effect and therefore the appropriate
tradition to describe agenda-setting theory.
Expanding beyond
the characteristics of objective approach and socio-psychological tradition of
agenda-setting theory, it’s important to closely examine how exactly the theory
functions and what it’s attempting to expose. Both McCombs and Shaw reference
Bernard Cohen, a political scientist at the University of Wisconsin as stating
“The press may not be successful much of the time in telling people what to
think, but it is stunningly successful in telling its readers what to think
about” ( Griffin ). One can see how prominent and influential this may be in
politics and election processes, as countlessly noted within the theories
examination. However, politics aside, theorists are able to draw on several applications
of influence in the agenda-setting theory.
The first step is to make sense of the media’s agenda.
Media agenda
refers to “The pattern of news coverage across major print and broadcast media
as measured by the prominence and length of stories” ( Griffin ). Dependent on
which form of media: print, broadcast, film, etc… certain positions,
prominences and length of stories, quantifies the effectiveness and perceptions
of the audience. In an article from the Malaysian Journal of Media Studies, author
Amira Sariyati Firdaus notes the media’s role as “a very important agenda
setter,” stating that “ideology” is the main influence on content, typically
derived from the government. Other, more
minor influences on media agenda’s include influences from decision-makers or
interest groups, who have policy making clout and also the journalists
themselves with their values, biases and personalities that shape the stories
or headlines ( Sariyati ).
Additionally, the
public agenda’s reflects “A composite index of media prominence revealed the
following order of importance: foreign policy, law and order, fiscal policy, public
welfare, and civil rights” ( Griffin ). The public agenda attempts to measure
the issues and their importance by conducting public opinion surveys, surveys which
McCombs and Shaw frequented in their research. “In the metaphorical language of
the theory, the media’s agenda sets the public’s agenda” ( Tankard ).
If the media’s
agenda is the prominent agenda, it should come to no surprise that the audience
is susceptible to the media’s ideologies, some individuals more than others.
The media has the upper hand and definitely serves as gatekeepers, meaning they
choose what the public sees or hears. Although, it’s to what extent each
individual’s need for orientation occurs. Deciphering between an individual’s high
interest on an issue combined with high uncertainty on that issue, is
reflective of their need for orientation ( Sariyati ). In
other words, the motivation factor of letting the media shape their thoughts, is
also known as index of curiosity ( Griffin ). For example, if one were getting ready board a
cruise ship set to sail the Pacific and a warning came across the television of
a new storm system developing in the Pacific Ocean, this would most likely
cause a level of concern for that individual, for it’s of high relevance and
high uncertainty.
Likewise, an
increasingly noted factor arising amidst the agenda-setting theory is framing.
Framing is “The selection of restricted number of thematically related
attributes for inclusion on the media agenda when a particular object or issue
is discussed” ( Griffin ). Noted mass communication scholar James Tankard adds
that media frame suggests “the central organizing idea for news content that
supplies a context and suggest what the issue is through the use of selection, emphasis, exclusion, and
elaboration” ( Griffin ). Essentially,
media time and time again sets both the agenda and also transfers the salience
of specific attributes belonging to the particular headlines of interest (
Griffin ).
Further, “Frames
are abstract notions that serve to organize or structure social meanings.
Frames influence the perception of the news of the audience, this form of
agenda-setting not only tells what to think about, but also how to think about
it” ( “Framing” ). Media has the power
to frame particular topics in a way that’s favorable to one side or the other,
particularly without showing biases, though they usually exist. Further noted is the idea that the media
often “…reflexively choose a conflict frame – who are the antagonists or opposing
forces”
( Tankard ). Negative or positive slants of media coverage
are consequences of framing
( Sariyati ). Framing is the subconscious,
subtle molding of particular stories and headlines that media exposes to its
seemingly vulnerable audience; planting seeds of relevance.
As illustrated, it’s
evident that media holds immense power over society. Agenda-setting theory
provides insight as to how commanding and transparent the media is when it
comes to delivering information and highlighting what it deems as important,
“newsworthy,” within the culture. With that said, it’s crucial media spend more
time and attention aiming to highlight some of the ever pressing issues of
health and well-being in today’s society. What if we took the concept and characteristics
of agenda-setting theory to focus on more positive and necessary applications
of mass media? In a day and age where healthcare wavers on the brink of
non-existence for many, it seems more important than ever to push personal
wellbeing issues to the forefront and bring about the attention, prevention and
information society desperately needs to live healthier, longer lives.
