Time Span of News Coverage as an Antecedent of Perceptual and Behavioral Components of Third-Person Effect

Xigen Li

City University of Hong Kong

Purpose of Study

This study extends the research of the third-person effect by taking into account the time span of media messages .

It explores perceived media effect of news coverage of short- and long-term issues.

It also explores the consequent behaviors due to the perceptual bias of media effects on oneself and others based on short- and long-term media messages.

Third-person effect

The perceptual hypothesis

The behavioral hypothesis

Media messages with negative connotation

Antecedent: exposure to media messages

– Level of media exposure

– Length of media exposure

Length of media exposure

Why length of media exposure matter?

Issue-attention cycle (Downs, 1972).

Time span of media coverage– Coverage intensity (continue over a short period of

time)

– Short-term and long-term coverage

Limited Capacity Model

Selective mental processing (Lang, 2000).

– Information relevant to the individual’s goals

– Unexpected information or a change in environment

People process the information that draws their immediate attention with more cognitive resource

(Kim & Paek, 2009).

Time span of media coverage

Messages of different time span could generate different responses from the audience.

Short-term message effect

– Reinforce perception

– Elevate concern of issues

– Issue salience goes with coverage amount

Immediate, but may not last long.

Time span of media coverage

Two frames of reference are used to interpret and process information (Entman, 1993)

– Short-term view’s impact on perceiving, organizing and interpreting information (Pan & Kosicki, 1993)

– Global and long-term views’ limited influence (Kinder, 1983)

Time span of media coverage

Media coverage of important social issues could be either for a short- or long-term.

– the swine flu pandemic in 2009

– the issue of global warming

Media coverage of short- and long-term issues, varied in their recency, relevance and coverage intensity

The difference will produce variance in perceived

media effect.

Nature of media messages

Perceived distance of messages.

– Physical

– psychological

Recency leads to short perceived message distance

The cognitive process with short self-message distance more accurately reflects the real message effects, compared to the distant message

Shorter the message distance, the greater perceived effect on self and others and the smaller the self–other discrepancy

Hypotheses

Message distance affects strength of perceived media effect

– Short-term messages

– Long-term messages

H1. Perceived media effect of the short-term issue is stronger than that of the long-term issue.

Hypotheses

Short-term messages are associated with greater perceived effect on self and others, then a smaller self–other discrepancy in perceived media effect compared to the long-term messages.

H2. The third-person effect of the short-term issue is weaker than that of the long-term issue.

Hypotheses

Media exposure was found to narrow the self-other perceptual gap (Wei, et al., 2008).

The effect of media exposure could be altered by time span of the message.

The discrepancy of perceived media effect on self and others vary by time span of the massage.

H3. Media exposure is a stronger negative predictor of the third-person effect of the short-term messages than that of the long-term messages.

Hypotheses

Perceived distance of the threat of the short-term issue would be closer than that of the long-term issue due to its recency and relevance.

Discrepancy in perceived media effect vary by time span of media message.

H4. Perceived distance of the threat is a stronger positive predictor of the third-person effect of the long-term messages than that of the short-term messages.

Hypotheses

People with high level of third-person perception are more likely to take action to reduce negative media effect

Harmful vs. non-harmful messages

With non-harmful messages, perceived media effect on self is likely to be a positive predictor of intention to take action to reduce negative effect of the issue.

Hypotheses

H5. Perceived media effect on self positively predicts intention to take action to reduce the negative effect of the short-term issue and the long-term issue.

H6. Perceived media effect on self of the short-term messages is a stronger predictor of intention to take action to reduce the negative effect than perceived media effect on self of the long-term messages.

H7. Perceived media effect on self is a stronger predictor of intention to take action to reduce the negative effect of the issue than the perceptual bias of media effects on oneself and others.

Method

A survy was conducted using a probability sample of Hong Kong residents.

two topics was selected for the study as the short-and long-term media messages: – 1) recently emerged poor air quality problem in Hong

Kong; recency, relevance to the community, intensity of the coverage

– 2) global warming

507 eligible respondents completed questionnaire

Table 1. Correlation matrix of the variables examined in the study, and the means and standard deviations of

the variables (N = 507)

* p <.05; ** p <.01

Exposure

-short

Distance-

short

Effect-

short-self

Effect-

short-other

Action

int-short

Exposure

-long

Distance-

long

Effect-

long-self

Effect-

long-other

Action

int-long

Exposure-short -

Distance-short .12** -

Effect-short-self .08 .45** -

Effect-short-

other .08 .34** .50** -

Action intent-

short .09* .23** .39** .20** -

Exposure-long .60** .14** .15** .06 .12** -

Distance-long .10* .44** .30** .23** .16** .19** -

Effect-long -self .09 .42** .46** .34** .33** .15** .46** -

Effect-long -

other .05 .27** .34** .37** .27** .13** .35** .64** -

Action Intent-

long .14** .23** .35** .18** .49** .15** .23** .34** .30** -

Mean 5.35 2.23 3.73 3.75 3.25 5.50 2.39 3.78 3.69 3.88

SD 2.97 .67 .66 .61 .60 2.8 .70 .68 .64 .41

Cronbach’s

alpha - .62 .85 .90 .63 - .58 .88 .90 .71

Findings for H1

Hypothesis 1, that perceived media effect of the short-term issue is stronger than that of the long-term issue, is not supported.

For both short-term and long-term messages, perceived media effect on self and on others are not statistically significant.

Findings for H2

Hypothesis 2, that the third-person effect of the short-term issue is weaker than that of the long-term issue, is not supported.

No third-person effect by the short-term messages was found.

For long-term messages, instead of the third-person effect, the first-person effect was found

Findings for H3

Hypothesis 3, that media exposure is a stronger negative predictor of the third-person effect of the short-term messages than that of the long-term messages, is not supported.

There was more exposure to the short-term messages than the long-term messages.

Media exposure was neither a predictor of the third-person effect by the short-term messages, nor for that of the long-term messages.

Findings for H4

Hypothesis 4, that perceived distance of the threat is a stronger positive predictor of the third-person effect of the long-term messages than that of the short-term messages, is not supported.

The threat of the short-term issue, the poor air quality problem, was seen closer than that of the long-term issue global warming.

The differences between the regression coefficients of perceived distance of the threat of the short-term and long-term messages were not statistically significant.

Findings for H5 and H6

The results supported hypothesis 5 that perceived media effect on self positively predicts intention to take action to reduce the negative effect of the short-term issue and the long-term issue.

H6, that perceived media effect on self of the short-term messages is a stronger predictor of intention to take action to reduce the negative effect than perceived media effect on self of the long-term

messages, is not supported.

Findings for H7

The results supported hypothesis 7 that perceived media effect on self is a stronger predictor of intention to take action to reduce the negative effect of the issue than the perceptual bias of media effects on oneself and others.

Perceptual bias of media effects on oneself and others was not a positive predictor

Perceived media effects of both the short-term messages and long-term issue on self were significant predictors of intention to take action to reduce the negative effect.

Discussion

This study found no third-person effect with the coverage of the short-term issue and the reversed third-person effect (first-person effect) with the coverage of the long-term issue.

For short-term messages

– Nature of the issue, no one can escape

– Perception of the issue, not totally new, routinized

Discussion

This study found the reverse third-person effect (the first-person effect) by media messages of the long-term issue, global warming

For long-term messages

– Social desirability (self-image protection; level of social desirability)

– self-affirmation theory (being intelligent, rational, independent)

– Issue localization

Discussion

The study reveals that time span of media messages was an important factor in producing the discrepancy of perceived media effect on self and others by short-term and long-term media messages.

Predictors of intention to take action, perceived media effect on self instead of third-person effect

Discussion

Other factors that may produce the third-person effect, such as the message attributes, issue salience, and perception of information source could be further explored.

For behavioral consequences of the third-person effect, message properties, such as relevance to one’s concerns and involvement in public interest, could produce different behaviors.

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