Agenda Setting and Mass Communication Theory

• Proponent of Agenda Setting Theory

  Maxwell McCombs and Donald Shaw
• Year proposed

  1972
• Historical context

  The collaborative research of Shaw and McCombs aimed to study the influential nature of media by analyzing the 1968 U.S. presidential elections
• Historical context

  McCombs and Shaw’s research found a definite correlation between the emphasis of the media on certain issues of the campaign and what the voters thought were important topics
• Agenda Setting Propositions

  (1) media’s selective emphasis on certain topics, (2) these highlights are then considered important by audiences, (3) setting up the content for the audience to discuss and reflect on, (4) assumes that media directly impacts people’s cognition instead of attitudes and beliefs, (5) its basic concept is “media tells us not what to think, but rather what to think about.”
• Example of media’s selective emphasis


  Newspapers physically emphasizing news through wording, sequencing, and formatting of headlines
• Examples of highlights being considered as important by the audiences


  Alice Guo becoming one of the hottest news for the past few months because of the continuous efforts of the media to cover every senate hearing involving her case.
• Examples of setting up the content for the audiences to discuss and reflect on 


  How the Alice Guo issue led to the creation of memes, prompted long discussions with some netizens even celebritizing the dismissed mayor.
• Theory Associations

  (1) Hypodermic-Needle Theory and (2) Multiple-step flow theory
• Hypodermic-needle theory

  Both theories assume the media’s direct influence on the audience. However, in contrast with agenda setting theory which aims to directly influence the cognition of the audience, the hypodermic-needle intends to directly impact the attitudes and opinions of individuals
• Multiple-step flow theory

  Both theories note the important aspect of social or interpersonal interaction for the attitudinal effects of media to take place.
• What does the multiple-step flow theory have that the agenda setting theory does not?

  “Opinion leaders” are needed for the behavioral effects of media to occur
• Three decisive factors of mass media

  (1) Ubiquity, (2) Cumulation, (3) Consonance
• Ubiquity factor in mass media

  Media being widespread and easily accessible to the masses
• Cumulation factor of the media

  How particular topics receive longer handling or control by the media.
• Cumulation factor of the media


  This is what the agenda setting theory commonly acts upon and it is what builds up significance and clarity of a certain topic to the audience
• Consonance

  How media outlets are inclined to provide similar stances on topics.
• Consonance

  This characteristic of media leads to fewer opportunities for individuals to engage in selective exposure when consuming mass media
• Negative side of AS THEORY: May impose social control


  Positive side of AS THEORY: Can provide order and organization in how we consume information in media.
• Objective of the chosen study in agenda setting theory

  To explore the association between political information shared on the social media app Facebook and its impact on the perceptions of important political issues among exposed and unexposed users of the platform
• Results of the study

  the perceptions of significant issues among users exposed to Facebook content were more aligned with the information being disseminated on facebook than users who were not exposed to such content. Their study further proves that even if the concept of Audience Fragmentation comes into play in today’s era of communication, the media can still have the capacity to set public agendas.