Kristen D. Landreville

The Irony of Satire Political Ideology and the Motivation to See What You Want to See in The Colbert Report

This study investigated biased message processing of political satire in The Colbert Report and the influence of political ideology on perceptions of Stephen Colbert. Results indicate that political ideology influences biased processing of ambiguous political messages and source in late-night comedy. Using data from an experiment (N = 332), we found that individual-level political ideology significantly predicted perceptions of Colberts political ideology. Additionally, there was no significant difference between the groups in thinking Colbert was funny, but conservatives were more likely to report that Colbert only pretends to be joking and genuinely meant what he said while liberals were more likely to report that Colbert used satire and was not serious when offering political statements. Conservatism also significantly predicted perceptions that Colbert disliked liberalism. Finally, a post hoc analysis revealed that perceptions of Colberts political opinions fully mediated the relationship between political ideology and individual-level opinion.

Evolution of Online Campaigning: Increasing Interactivity in Candidate Web Sites and Blogs Through Text and Technical Features

Political candidates have responded to the publics desire to use the Internet as an interactive information source by creating their own online presence. This study is a content analysis of the Web sites and blogs of the 10 Americans vying to be the Democratic candidate for the 2004 presidential election. Focusing on interactivity, data indicated front pages hyperlink to participation areas such as Donation or Volunteer sections and rarely linked to external content. Blogs used hyperlinks at a rate less than Web sites. Interactivity was encouraged through text, as 83.7% of Web sites asked voters to become more involved. Blog posts discussed issues and attacked the opponents, including President Bush. For the most part, blog posts were personal in nature and used direct address. The tactical use of advanced Web site features showed a technological progression of political campaigning and an overall increase in interactivity through technology and text.

Blogging and Hyperlinking: use of the Web to enhance viability during the 2004 US campaign

This study focuses on the online campaigning of presidential candidates during the 2004 US presidential campaign. A random sample of the front pages of the websites and weblogs (“blogs”) of George W. Bush and John Kerry was collected between Labor Day and Election Day 2004. These pages were analyzed in order to examine both candidate blogs and websites in terms of online fundraising, hyperlinking practices, and concentration on certain political issues. Results suggest that candidates more frequently use websites than blogs as fundraising mechanisms. In terms of hyperlinking, the Bush and Kerry campaigns were likely to confine visitors to the bounds of their websites by providing links to content within the overall site, but also linked consistently to outside, advocating sources. On the other hand, candidate blogs were more likely to provide directives to external links. Regarding issues discussed online by the campaigns, results suggest marked differences between the most salient issues in candidate blogs as opposed to candidate websites.

The Effects of Political Advertising on Young Voters

Political advertising effects on candidate evaluations, issue recall, political cynicism, and gender differences are explored in this pretest—posttest examination of 764 young adult participants. Results show no major gender differences in evaluation of candidates. Participants reported learning more about Bushs image and more about Kerrys issues through the ads. Exposure to ads did not produce increased cynicism among the participants but significantly increased political information efficacy.

When is Fiction as Good as Fact? Comparing the Influence of Documentary and Historical Reenactment Films on Engagement, Affect, Issue Interest, and Learning

This study advances documentary film effects research by comparing the influence of a political documentary with a historical reenactment film on narrative engagement, affect, learning, and interest. Using the Rwandan genocide as a context of study, a documentary film, The Triumph of Evil, and the historical reenactment fictional film, Hotel Rwanda, were examined. Results revealed significant differences between documentary and historical reenactment film exposure for affective responses and issue knowledge gain. However, increased issue interest and narrative engagement were not significantly different for the two stimulus groups, suggesting that dramatic fictional reenactments of socio-political events lead to increased issue interest as much or more than the live footage and factual account of events offered in a documentary. The results of this study are discussed in terms of their importance for key democratic outcome variables (e.g., knowledge and participation), along with suggestions for future documentary film research.

Filtering 2008 US presidential election news on YouTube by elites and nonelites: An examination of the democratizing potential of the internet

The goals of this study are to explore several claims about the democratizing potential of the internet and to extend gatekeeping theory into user-generated content (UGC) domain. A quantitative content analysis of the most popular YouTube political news videos during the 2008 US presidential election was conducted to investigate the degree to which nonelites were able to partake in mainstream public discourse. We found that elites dominated first and second filters (news sourcing and news production) in the flow of online news, while nonelites dominated the third filter (news distribution). These results suggest that an update to the traditional gatekeeping model is needed to reflect the realities of today’s user-driven communication environment.

The Influence of Late-Night TV Comedy Viewing on Political Talk: A Moderated-Mediation Model:

This study is focused on the influence of late-night TV comedy viewing on political talk. It is posited that debate viewing serves as a mediator of this relationship, and age is argued to be a moderator of the association between late-night TV comedy viewing and debate viewing. More specific to age, it is hypothesized that the predictive value of late-night TV comedy for political debate consumption will be greater for those audience members who are younger. A secondary analysis of 2004 national Annenberg debate panel data provides evidence of a positive indirect effect of late-night TV comedy viewing on political talk through debate viewing, and the moderator of age functioned as predicted. Thus, this study details a series of positive unintended consequences of late-night TV comedy viewing on what are defined normatively as positive democratic communicative activities (i.e., debate viewing, political discussion), and these media effects are stronger the younger the voter.

Humor Works in Funny Ways: Examining Satirical Tone as a Key Determinant in Political Humor Message Processing

This multi-experiment study builds upon extant political entertainment theory, testing whether satire type (horatian versus juvenalian) cues varying processing mechanisms (message discounting versus resource allocation), and if consequential differences to argument scrutiny levels or message persuasiveness result. Using novel stimuli (e.g., animated cartoons, study one) and real-world late-night political satire (The Daily Show and The Colbert Report, study two), results suggest that satire type was a key antecedent in political humor message processing. Additionally, the varying mechanisms had differential effects on political argument scrutiny levels and message persuasiveness.

Working Through Political Entertainment: How Negative Emotion and Narrative Engagement Encourage Political Discussion Intent in Young Americans

This study examines how a political entertainment film (Man of the Year) can impact an individuals political discussion intent after the same political topic is made salient in a subsequent news story. In addition, a process of communication influence is assessed when the roles of negative emotion and narrative engagement are considered as potential mediators of the relationship between political entertainment film viewing and political discussion intent. Seven hypotheses serve as the foundation for this experimental study, and structural equation modeling was used to test these hypotheses. Results reveal there was no direct influence of political entertainment film viewing on political discussion intent, but there was an indirect effect through negative emotion. Furthermore, narrative engagement emerged as a predictor of political discussion intent and a mediator of the association between negative emotion and political discussion intent.

Examining the Intertextuality of Fictional Political Comedy and Real-World Political News

This study examines the intertextuality of a fictional political comedy and a political news article. In an experiment, participants watched the political comedy Man of the Year or a control film, read a politically relevant news article on electronic voting, and were asked their discussion intention about the political issue featured in the news article. Beyond direct effects, the mediating influence of elaboration about the politically relevant news article on discussion intent was analyzed. Results revealed no main effect of political comedy viewing on discussion intent, and no mediating effect of elaboration either. However, viewing the fictional political comedy was associated with higher levels of elaboration about the related news article, which shows evidence of intertextuality among media texts. Moreover, perceived external realism of the fictional political comedy was a significant positive predictor of discussion intent about the news article. Results also showed perceived external realism about the fictional political comedy to be a nearly significant moderator of the elaboration and discussion intent relationship. A broader discussion regarding the theoretical and practical implications of the findings is included.