Lecture Ten - Agenda Setting

Upon entering Forgan Smith once again we commenced today's JOUR1111 lecture on Agenda Setting, in which there was quite a lot of material to be covered. Like many things, the theory of Agenda Setting is fairly blatant. They way in which ones perception of reality is constructed is through communication and media. The media play a marginal role in the construction of what we understand to be the social world and it is here that Agenda Setting is introduced.

There are four main categories of Agendas:

PUBLIC AGENDA- The set of topics that members of the public perceive as important.

POLICY AGENDA - issues that decision makers think are salient. (i.e. legislators).

CORPORATE AGENDA - issues that big business & corporations consider important.

MEDIA AGENDA - issues discussed in the media 

With these four interrelating categories in mind a definition of Agenda Setting can be made :-

"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."

(insert diagram)

With all this being said, there are two basic assumptions of Agenda Settings that have been developed, those being:

1. The Mass media do not merely reflect and report reality, they filter and shape it.

2. Media concentration on a few issues and subjects leads the public to perceive those issues as more important than other issues.

But where did Agenda Setting come from? There were two main theories of this shown:

1. 1920’s – Harold Lasswell - the mass media “injects” direct influence into the audience. Also known as the “Magic Bullet” model.

(however there were limitations such as this is all one way, non-thinking, biological uniformity of reactions)

2. Walter Lippman (newspaper columnist) in his book “Public Opinion” - the mass media creates images of events in our minds

First Level Agenda Setting Theory: This is for the most part studied by researchers and emphasises the major issues and "the transfer of the salience of those issues." At this level the media suggest what the public should focus on through coverage.

Second Level Agenda Setting Theory: This is essentially, how the media focuses on the attributes of the issues. The media suggests how people should think about an issue

After going through what seemed like a tonne of background of Agenda Setting, we came to the question of what Agenda Setting actually does. There are three key points to the use of Agenda Setting:

1. Transfers issues of salience from the news media to the public.

2. Transfers issues of salience for both issues and other objects such as political figures.

3. Elite media often sets the agenda for issues in other media

Personally I found a particular quote by McCombs (2004) that really stood out to enforce the importance of Agenda Setting.
"Agenda Setting is not always the diabolical plan by journalists to control the minds of the public but 'an inadvertent by-product of the necessity to focus' the news"

We were then shown the "family" of Agenda Setting:

> Media Gate-keeping - the exposure of an issue

> Media Advocacy - the purposive promotion of a message through the media

> Agenda Cutting - most of the reality that's happening in the world is not represented

> Agenda Surfing - the media follows the crowd of trends

> The Diffusion of News - the process through which an important event is communicated to the public 

> Portrayal of an Issue - the way an issue is portrayed of influences public perception

> Media Dependence - the more relied upon the public are on the media the more they are likely to become bias (most commonly relied upon now-days Facebook/Twitter)

We then looked at and discussed the strengths and weaknesses of the 'Agenda Setting Theory'

The Strengths

•It has explanatory power because it explains why most people prioritise the same issues as important. •It has predictive power because it predicts that if people are exposed to the same media, they will feel the same issues are important. 

•It has organising power because it helps organise existing knowledge of media effects. 

•It can be proven false. If people aren't exposed to the same media, they won’t feel the same issues are important.

•Its meta-theoretical assumptions are balanced on the scientific side.

•It lays groundwork for further research.

The Weaknesses

•Media users may not be as ideal as the theory assumes. People may not be well-informed, deeply engaged in public affairs, thoughtful and sceptical. Instead, they pay casual and intermittent attention to public affairs, often ignorant of the details.

•For people who have made up their minds, the effect is weakened.

•News cannot create and conceal problems. The effect can merely alter the awareness, priorities and salience people attach to a set of problems.

FINALLY we discussed the now 24hour news cycle that we have at hand and its accessibility to the community. This means news gets out faster and media types such as newspapers and magazines may no longer have the latest or most interesting story to be told.

Overall I thoroughly enjoyed this lecture, even though there was so much information to blog my mind has now turned to slop, none the less it was very educational and made coming to Uni for an hour very worth while!