Deck 11: Effect of Media on Knowledge, Information, and Perception of Social Issues

Question 1

_________ combines many ideas about media effects into a global perspective on how campaign communication can change our actions and achieve pro-social objectives.

A) Gratifications theory
B) Moderate effects theory
C) Social marketing theory
D) Targeting

Answer 1

C

Question 2

Which phrase best summarizes agenda setting theory?

A) When media provide prominent coverage of events, we "tune out"
B) When media provide prominent coverage of events, we "tune in"
C) Media don't tell us what to think, they tell us what to think about
D) Media don't tell us what to think about, they tell us what to think

Answer 2

C

Question 3

Diffusion theory assumes that ___________ are most effective in spreading acceptance of innovations.

A) change agents
B) powerful media
C) opinion leaders
D) tribal elders

Answer 3

A

Question 4

A popular rock star becomes involved in a scandal that raises questions concerning his close association with white supremacists. People become hesitant to defend him publicly and he loses a valuable advertising contract. This example best illustrates _________.

A) social cognitive theory
B) media dependency theory
C) spiral of silence theory
D) primacy effects theory

Question 5

One of the differences between agenda-setting and agenda-building is that the former is more ________ and the latter more ________ in its view of media effects.

A) positive/negative
B) negative/positive
C) macroscopic/microscopic
D) microscopic/macroscopic

Question 6

When Apple Computers cut the price of its popular iPhone to spur sales soon after the device's introduction, those who had already bought the phone, or the ___________, were angry.

A) early adopters
B) change agents
C) agenda-builders
D) primers

Question 7

Researchers have documented systematic differences in knowledge between better-informed and less informed segments of the population that can be attributed to the differing availability of news. This is referred to as the ______.

A) ubiquity effect
B) spiral-of-silence
C) priming effect
D) knowledge gap

Question 8

In information/innovation diffusion theory, those who directly influence early adopters and opinion leaders are called _______.

A) media elites
B) change agents
C) first-order adopters
D) primers

Question 9

Research that demonstrated a significant knowledge gap between American television news viewers and those in several other countries attributed that gap to _______.

A) the public service orientation of television news in those other countries
B) lack of media literacy training in the U.S.
C) the complexity of political life in the U.S. versus those countries
D) the lack of intelligence of typical U.S. TV viewers

Question 10

The OMA model of digital information use predicts that differences in opportunities, _______, and abilities to access that information will predict knowledge and political action.

A) management of time
B) multitasking
C) money
D) motivations

Question 11

Like closely related diffusion theory, social marketing theory is practically oriented and essentially ________.

A) interpretive
B) channel-centered
C) receiver-oriented
D) source-dominated

Question 12

When online news sites and legacy media shape one another's news coverage, ______ is said to occur.

A) reciprocal agenda-building
B) intermedia agenda-building
C) intermedia agenda-setting
D) agenda-chasing

Question 13

When news outlets, in their quest for audience, rely on social media sharing and Internet search data to determine what stories to cover rather than rely on the editorial judgment of their editors and journalists, ___________ is said to occur.

A) reciprocal agenda-building
B) intermedia agenda-building
C) intermedia agenda-setting
D) agenda-chasing

Question 14

Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann argued identified three characteristics of the news media that produce a scarcity of points-of-view. One, _________, refers to the similarity of values held by journalists that influences the content they produce.

A) consonance
B) ubiquity
C) cumulation
D) agreement

Question 15

Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann argued that people employ their ______, something of a 6^th sense allowing them to assess the distribution of opinions for and against their ideas.

A) gut reaction
B) knowledge of Facebook "likes"
C) quasi-statistical organ
D) reading of the cultural data

Question 16

Microscopic level theories are concerned with how mass communication can bring about major changes in the social world.

Question 17

The ubiquity of smartphones has erased the digital divide.

Question 18

Information/innovation diffusion theory assigns a primary and significant role to mass media in spreading information and innovations.

Question 19

A meta-analysis identifies important consistencies in previous research findings on a specific topic and systematically integrates them into a fuller understanding.

Question 20

Research indicates that spiral of silence is a face-to-face phenomenon; it does not operate in online environments.

Question 21

Social marketing theory recognizes contemplators, people who have prioritized an attitude, service, or behavior but must be confronted with a situation in which they are compelled to act.

Question 22

Knowledge gaps are typically found between people of different educational levels.

Question 23

When the amount of serious news coverage increases, knowledge gaps tend to increase.

Question 24

Knowledge gap research has identified a constant gap; that is, the knowledge gap remains regardless of people's level of access to a growing number of news sources.

Question 25

Shanto Iyengar and Donald Kinder's agenda-setting research identified the influence of priming, the idea that that dramatic news accounts undermined rather than increased television's agenda-setting power.

Question 26

People remain silent about issues when they think prevailing opinion is against them because they fear isolation or separation from those around them.

Question 27

Research on spiral of silence is sufficiently robust that there is little criticism of this important theory.

Question 28

Research has demonstrated that the position of a report in a news broadcast influences its agenda-setting power.

Question 29

Agenda-setting theory states that media tell us what to think.

Question 30

One reason that audiences have a scarcity of opinion to choose from in the media, according to Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann, is cumulation, the idea that news media tend to repeat stories and perspectives across their different individual programs or editions, across the different media themselves, and across time.