Chapter 8

Which of the following would be most likely found in a positive issue ad?

"Malia is dedicated to finding ways to improve our community healthcare system." "Representative Nadal has been a breath of fresh air in the state house." "Ms. Roberts has long been an advocate for improving our schools."

The Telegraph and Texas Register is remembered as the originator of what rallying cry?

"Remember the Alamo!"

At the time of the founding of the nation, journalists were called

"newsmongers."

As of 2016, about _____ percent of the adult population in the United States subscribed to satellite radio.

19

In 2017, a UT/Texas Tribune poll found that what percent of Texans favor legalization of marijuana for medical purposes?

80 percent

What is a potential pitfall for candidates who use digital campaigning?

Any problematic statement or action, if digitally recorded, can come back to haunt them.

The impact that round-the-clock news coverage has had on the media is called the _____ effect.

CNN

In its 2017 polling, the UT/Tribune survey determined what about Texans' approval of the U.S. Supreme Court?

Democrats have a much higher rate of approval.

True or false: The use of attack ads is decreasing because they often backfire and harm the sponsoring candidate rather than the intended target.

False

_____ are carefully planned discussions designed to obtain perceptions on a defined area of interest in a permissive, non-threatening environment.

Focus groups

What is the most widely circulated newspaper in Texas today?

Houston Chronicle

How has the Internet affected political campaigns' ability to control their messages?

It has increased it.

Which of the following is a problematic aspect of citizen journalism?

It may not be based upon facts.

Why is Texas a state in which digital media can be especially cost-saving for statewide campaigns?

It's very large and costly to travel to all areas in person.

Though over 10 billion tweets go out on Twitter every day, what did researchers at Carnegie Mellon University discover about people's opinions of many of those tweets?

Less than one-third of the tweets reflected information worth reading.

The most popular podcasts reflect content hosted by

National Public Radio.

Which of the following contributed to changes in polling in the 1970s?

Politicians began taking polling more seriously. The relative complexity of political issues in the U.S. increased.

In 1948, Texas's first television station began operating and broadcast a speech by whom?

President Harry Truman

_____ provides a specific context and background through which audiences engage with a particular topic or story.

Priming

Texas's government is predominantly

Republican

_____ factors include things like income, education, race, and ethnicity; they can affect voter turnout.

Socioeconomic

In what language was Texas's first newspaper published?

Spanish

_____ are perhaps the greatest threat to traditional media's longevity.

Streaming services

In its 2017 polling, the UT/Tribune survey determined what about Texans' support for ending the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, as outlined by the Trump administration?

Texas Republicans are split over DACA.

In its 2016 polling, the UT/Tribune survey determined what about support for Republican Governor Abbot?

Texas Republicans supported him overwhelmingly.

In which of the following ways have social media proven to be disruptive to the traditional forms of media?

They expose many to news outside of mainstream sources. They allow citizens to shape the news agenda. They have made people part of the news as it happens.

Which of the following correctly describes how the news media treat negative ads?

They often denounce them on air.

True or false: Connecting with the public directly is the most important advantage that the Internet offers political campaigns.

True

What role did Twitter play in the 2016 Dallas Black Lives Matter protest march shootings?

Tweets helped proved that a suspected shooter was actually innocent.

Texas gubernatorial candidate Wendy Davis received a big boost in popularity after her senatorial filibuster speech went viral on

Twitter.

According to Harold Lasswell's model, what questions should we ask in order to better understand "the media"?

Who is the audience? Who is the sender? What is the method? What is the message?

Citizen journalism is especially problematic on _____, as described in the text, because people generally ignore the site's guidelines about attribution.

YouTube

The era of the 1920s and 1930s saw a "convergence of change" that had a big effect on polling. Which of the following were factors in that "convergence"?

a growing concern over accuracy the founding of polling organizations the media pushing for more data

Baum and Potter argue that the mass media, as an institution in our democracy, traditionally act as a conduit for information up and down between the political elite and their constituents. This describes

a linkage mechanism.

Candidate Ronald Reagan's 1984 "Morning in America" campaign commercial was designed to make viewers feel good about Reagan. What type of ad was this?

a positive issue ad

Which of the following are among the influences that affect individual Texans' opinions?

a traditionalistic culture conservatively biased media coverage

The power of the media to bring issues and problems to the public's attention is called

agenda setting

In the example of the news coverage of Texas's Child Protective Services and its severe problems, the issue finally received attention only after it was covered in the media. This is an example of

agenda setting.

What category of public opinion is "the simple sum of many individual opinions"?

aggregation

In the 1990 GOPAC push to get Republican candidates elected, Newt Gingrich helped develop _____ into a fine art.

attack ads

The collection, dissemination, and analysis of news and information by the general public, especially by means of the Internet, is called _____ journalism.

citizen

What was the location of the earliest radio stations in Texas?

college campuses

The general trend in the U.S. is that network television viewership is

declining.

The purpose of mass media gatekeeping is

determining newsworthiness.

The echo chamber effect results in

diminished exposure to conflicting information.

Which of the following would be classified as spending on traditional media for a political campaign?

direct mail television ads billboards

When users self-select information on social media, the result is a(n)

echo chamber.

In terms of medium, which of the following are categorizations we use?

electronic print

Soft news's purpose is to

entertain.

Facebook, especially after it changed its algorithms, has _____ the echo chamber effect.

exacerbated

The category of public opinion that is defined as "rhetorical construction used so freely in our newspapers and on television as to be meaningless" is called

fiction.

How many broad definitions of public opinion are there?

five

George Lakoff has pointed out that while deciding what is news has a huge impact on public perception of an issue, how it is _____ significantly influences public reaction to it.

framed

Research has shown that newspapers from counties near the U.S.-Mexico border tend to have an overall negative slant toward immigrants. This "slant" is an example of

framing

____________ is the media's attempts to focus attention on certain events and place them in context for meaning.

framing

What did "freedom of the press" mean at the time of the founding of the U.S.?

freedom to use an actual printing press

Mass media filter down all of what is happening in a given community into a specific set of news that is then transmitted to an audience. This is called

gatekeeping.

In his 1992 presidential campaign, Ross Perot spent $34.8 billion of his own money on a series of

infomercials.

Deeply researched stories that uncover serious crime, corruption, or corporate wrongdoing are called _____ journalism, something in which notable news magazines engage.

investigative

Which of the following best characterizes a "public"?

its communicative nature

The Founders named the _____ as preeminent in American democracy.

legislature

The category of public opinion that is defined as "a projection of what journalists, politicians, and 'elites' believe" is called

media/elite opinion.

In a landmark 1986 survey of journalists, researchers found that journalists overwhelmingly perceived themselves to be _____ the owners of the media and the public in general.

more liberal than

As of 2013, approximately what percentage of Americans rely upon television broadcasts for their news?

more than 50 percent

According to Jan E. Leighley's research, when the mass media are watchdogs on government and on the political elite, they are following the _____ model.

neutral adversaries

As compared to newspapers, news magazines

offer more substantive coverage.

What type of survey reinterviews people to determine changes in opinion over time?

panel survey

A digital audio file made available on the Internet for downloading to a computer or portable media player, typically available as a series, is a

podcast

The process through which we learn political attitudes and opinions is called

political socialization.

A television ad with a candidate on horseback, looking rugged with his loyal dog beside him and describing how he wants to protect Second Amendment rights, would be an example of what type of ad?

positive issue ad

When the local newspaper and local television station repetitively cover a story about a new stadium opening, that repetition is an example of

priming.

What type of survey interviews a scientifically determined sampling of people within a population?

probability sample survey

According to Jan E. Leighley's research, when the mass media are pushers of a particular individual/politician, product, or idea, they are following the _____ model.

propagandist

What are the three broad functions the media serve within their communities?

providing information acting as linkage institutions shaping perception

The _____ is a community's arena. It allows individuals to freely discuss and identify societal problems and influence political action.

public sphere

Political scientist Thomas Patterson argues that the _____ that citizens can access affects their interest in the news.

quality of information

When media reinforce and magnify existing beliefs about the reality of an event, it is an example of _____

resonance

When media reinforce and magnify existing beliefs about the reality of an event, it is an example of _________

resonance

The media cultivate and influence the public's social reality and mirror society's culture back to the viewer through

resonance.

The reinforcement and magnification of existing beliefs about the reality and commonality of events due to the presentation of reality by the media is called

resonance.

What is the literal meaning of "democracy"?

rule by the people

One big advantage of the use of digital media for political campaigns is that it

saves money.

Push polls are considered outright illegitimate because

scientific sampling is not used. they attack opposing candidates and ideas.

The systematic selection of particular news that presents a distorted view of reality is called _____ bias.

selection

The earliest form of public opinion polling (as we know it today) consisted of newspapers setting up outside polling places and interviewing voters after they cast their ballots. These polls are called

straw polls.

Pandora, Spotify, and Netflix are examples of

streaming services.

Push polls are best described as

targeted attacks.

Focus groups usually include fewer than _____ individuals at a time.

ten

According to anthropologist Thomas de Zengotita, what 1963 event, which was widely covered in the media, changed people's perception of the news?

the assassination of President Kennedy in Dallas

During what era of American history did almost 95 percent of U.S. households own radios?

the end of World War II

Which of the following are agents of socialization in the U.S.?

the media peer groups family religious institutions education

A crucial element to the success of streaming services is

the use of smartphones.

Today, we use "press" and "media" somewhat interchangeably. At the founding of the nation,

these two words had more nuanced meanings.

Which of the following contribute to media selection bias?

time personnel budgetary constraints

What is the point of a push poll?

to attack a candidate or issue

How many notable news magazines are published in Texas?

two

Approximately what portion of American adults use at least one form of social media to share information?

two-thirds

When candidates and campaigns use social media sites to share news with the public, they are better able to control

what is covered. who sees the news. how a story is covered.

The authors' example of the effect of public opinion on the increasing number of dismissals for small amounts of marijuana possession demonstrates that

when conflict arises, public opinion is mobilized and affects the political elite.