LECTURE 10 REVIEW: AGENDA SETTING

Agenda setting – now this is one hot topic in journalism studies.

“Agenda setting is the process of the mass media presenting certain issues frequently and prominently with the result that large segments of the public come to perceive those issues as more important than others. Simply put, the more coverage an issue receives, the more important it is to people.”

~ Coleman, McCombs, Shaw & Weaver (2008)

People’s idea of reality is influenced by external factors. These factors can be society and the media. The way we perceive reality is mediated through our social life and the media. There are four agendas when it comes to agenda setting – the public agenda, policy agenda, corporate agenda, and media agenda. These four agendas are interrelated.

The “original” reality directly influences the “media reality” and the “public reality”. Reality can originate from the society, the economy, the political and so on. These issues are transmitted to the media via Public Relations (PR) and direct influence. Through selection processes and inter-media agenda setting, the media transmits the information they want to the general public. The public form their own construct of reality via direct impressions and daily social interactions and of course, from what they gather from the media.

There are 2 basic assumptions of media agenda setting – mass media filter ad shape reality, and media concentration affects the perception of importance of certain issues. Walter Lippman states that propaganda (through the media) is a tool that shape images in the minds of people in support of enterprises, groups and ideas. The hypodermic needle model definitely supports that statement. It is said that mass media is like a needle, “injecting” influences in the minds of audience to form certain images. Lippman argued that people should think critically for themselves rather than form judgments based on images the media feed us.

“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.”

~ Bernard Cohen, 1963

Agenda setting theory can be broken down into two levels. Level one is where the media suggest WHAT we should focus on. Level two is where the media suggest HOW we should think. What agenda setting does is to transfer the importance of certain issues from mass media to the public. Also, elite media often have influence over what other media publish. As Dr Redman said, the media set the agenda simply because they can.

Agenda setting comprises of 7 components.

1. Media gatekeeping is about how and what the media chooses to report to the public.
2. Media advocacy is the use of the media to promote certain messages to the public.
3. Agenda cutting refers to the fact that though there are so many issues in the world to report on, the media only reports on some. Thus, certain important issues lose their significance because they are overshadowed by other shallow news.
4. Agenda surfing is simply the media jumping on the bandwagon by following what the current trends and reporting on what the general public wants.
5. The diffusion of news is about how, when, where news are released. Are certain news released immediately after they happen? Or do we wait a few days before announcing it to the public?
6. Portrayal of an issue encompasses the fact that the way issues are portrayed by the media affects the way the public perceive them.
7. Media dependence is critical because a person is more susceptible to media agenda setting if he is very dependent on the media for information.

The current focus on agenda setting nowadays is the 24hours new cycle. With the internet and cable news (especially with 24hour news channels), who influences who when it comes to agenda setting? In the old days, newspapers set the agenda of the day. They were printed and distributed in the morning, and that affected the other news outlets like radio. Nowadays, with the various outlets of news like social networks, how can we be sure who influences who?

The bottom-line of agenda setting can be reduced to one simple question, which I will leave you with. The main point of agenda setting is:

“WHAT’S BIG AT THE MOMENT?”