Spiro Kiousis

Public Trust or Mistrust? Perceptions of Media Credibility in the Information Age

This article explores perceptions of news credibility for television, newspapers, and online news. A survey was administered to a randomly selected sample of residents in Austin, Texas, to assess peoples attitudes toward these 3 media channels. Contingent factors that might influence news credibility perceptions, such as media use and interpersonal discussion of news, were incorporated into the analysis. Findings suggest that people are generally skeptical of news emanating from all 3 media channels but do rate newspapers with the highest credibility, followed by online news and television news, respectively. Furthermore, opinions about news credibility seem to be correlated across media outlets. The data also show a moderate negative linkage between interpersonal discussion of news and perceptions of media credibility for television news but not for newspapers. When controlling for basic demographics, a positive correlation was found between interpersonal communication and online news credibility. Finally, a marginal association was noted between media use and public perceptions of credibility across all 3 media channels.

Understanding Influence on Corporate Reputation: An Examination of Public Relations Efforts, Media Coverage, Public Opinion, and Financial Performance From an Agenda-Building and Agenda-Setting Perspective

Seeking to extend research on public relations evaluation, this study investigates the influence of public relations efforts and media coverage on corporate reputation and financial performance through the theoretical grounding of first- and second-level agenda-building and agenda-setting. A triangulation of research methods compared public relations content, news media coverage, public opinion, and corporate financial performance for 28 U.S. companies from the annual Harris Interactive (2005) Reputation Quotient. Evidence for agenda-building and agenda-setting propositions was found, which work to inform strategies of public relations practitioners. The implications of the findings are discussed.

Candidate Image Attributes Experiments on the Substantive Dimension of Second Level Agenda Setting

This study examined the role of attribute salience in the agenda setting process. Two experiments were conducted to investigate how media emphasis on certain political candidate attributes would influence public perceptions of those politicians. Specifically, media portrayals of candidate personality and qualification traits were explored. Findings suggest that peoples impressions of candidate personality traits mirror media portrayals of those traits. However, media portrayals of personality traits do not affect a candidates overall salience. The data also indicate that candidate qualifications do influence affective perceptions of politicians. Finally, the authors consider the ramifications of these results on future scholarship.

Agenda-Setting Effects and Attitude Strength Political Figures during the 1996 Presidential Election

This study examined the consequences of agenda-setting effects for attitudes toward political figures during the 1996 presidential election. In particular, guided by the literature from agenda setting, attitude strength, and the hierarchy of effects, the analysis tested hypotheses about the relationships among media coverage, public salience, and the strength of public attitudes regarding a set of 11 political figures. The findings indicate that increased media attention to political figures is correlated with higher levels of public salience and attitude strength. In addition, multivariate tests showed that one dimension of attitude strength, dispersion of opinions, mediated the relationship between media coverage and public salience. The implications of the results are also discussed.

First- and Second-Level Agenda-Building and Agenda-Setting Effects: Exploring the Linkages Among Candidate News Releases, Media Coverage, and Public Opinion During the 2002 Florida Gubernatorial Election

This study explores the role of candidate news releases, media content, and public opinion in shaping the salience of political issues and candidate images during the 2002 Florida gubernatorial election. The study analyzed 77 news releases, 654 newspaper stories, and public opinion data from a statewide survey of 572 respondents. Significant correlations were found supporting both first- and second-level agenda building and agenda-setting effects. Theoretical and practical implications of the findings are discussed.

Compelling Arguments and Attitude Strength Exploring the Impact of Second-Level Agenda Setting on Public Opinion of Presidential Candidate Images

This study explores the relationship between attribute agenda setting and public opinion of political candidates. Specifically, media salience of presidential candidate attributes across five national elections is compared to public opinion data measuring perceived candidate salience and the strength of public attitudes regarding candidates. Findings suggest that media salience of attributes is strongly linked with strengthened attitudes and is moderately linked with perceived candidate salience. The implications of the findings are also discussed.

International agenda-building and agenda-setting: Exploring the influence of public relations counsel on US news media and public perceptions of foreign nations

To explore the influence of international public relations on US news media and public perceptions of foreign nations, this study used a triangulation of methods by comparing public relations counsel for foreign nations, media content and public opinion data in 1998 and 2002. The results indicate that while the relationship between public relations counsel and media coverage was minimal at the level of object and substantive attribute salience, noteworthy linkages were observed with affective attribute salience. In general, public relations counsel was associated with a decrease in the amount of negative news coverage. At the level of individual news stories, it was connected to increased positive valence in media content. For the dimensions of news coverage associated with public relations, media salience was related to public salience and attitudes regarding foreign nations. Theoretical and practical implications of the findings are discussed.

Intermedia Agenda-Setting and Political Activism: MoveOn.org and the 2008 Presidential Election

This study tested for intermedia agenda-setting effects among explicitly partisan news media coverage and political activist group, citizen activist, and official campaign advertisements on YouTube—all in support of the same candidate. The setting for this investigation was the political activist organization MoveOn.orgs “Obama in 30 Seconds” online ad contest, which was held during the 2008 U.S. presidential election primaries. The data provided evidence of first- and second-level agenda-setting relationships. Partial correlations revealed that the citizen activist issue agenda, as articulated in the contest ads, was most strongly related to the partisan media coverage, rather than to the issue priorities of the official Obama or MoveOn.org ads on YouTube. These results extend the intermedia agenda-setting framework to political activist communication efforts and consumer-generated content.

Deliberative Learning: An Evaluative Approach to Interactive Civic Education

This study incorporates the perspective of deliberative democracy in proposing a framework for evaluating relationships between civic education and political development. Findings support a conception of deliberative learning as a process in which interactive curricula result in the diffusion of discursive inclinations to families and peer groups. These orientations, in turn, foster receptivity to future opportunities for learning through news attention and primary-group discussion. Data were derived from an evaluation of high school curricula taught in conjunction with the 2002 election. Participation in deliberative instruction predicted the following behaviors one year later: news attention, issue salience, political discussion with parents and friends, size of discussion network, willingness to disagree and to listen to opponents, and testing out opinions in conversation.

Using Social Media in Times of Crisis

ABSTRACT The role of social media in crisis communications is an embryonic area of research in tourism, thus the purpose of this study was to examine drivers of social media use during crises. An online survey of 2,416 tourists from Australia, Brazil, China, India, and Korea was conducted. Hierarchical regression revealed that the drivers were risk perceptions associated with crime, disease, health-related, physical, equipment failure, weather, cultural barriers, and political crises when controlling for nationality, as well as use of a smartphone during past travel when controlling for nationality and risk perceptions. Implications and recommendations are discussed.