real news - fake cynicism?.pdf
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Media is a major subject of concern when related to public opinion. Because media play a crucial
role in forming ones values, the content it broadcasts may have an influence on ones political
dispositions, and therefore have major political consequences.
Some critics fear that mass media actually influence public opinion toward acceptance of the
economic system and the domination of elite (Herman & Chomsky 1988). Therefore, they argue
that alternative and critical media are necessary to counter the influence of such opinion
mechanisms.
But is critical attitude always good?
The emergence of The Daily Show, a satirical news show whose primary material are political
news, since 1999, has been one of the most notable phenomenons in U.S. political coverage. The
Daily Showhas been highly influential and praised for its coverage, especially during presidential
campaign.
But, in a very critical article, Hart (2007) defines Jon Stewart, the most prominent political
comedian in the US, as a political sinner . According to him, Stewart increases cynicism,
conveys a simplistic view about politics, and builds a business around it. He creates a religion that
gives the illusion that there is a separation between the Evil Washington and the Good people/
One should ask whether these accusations are accurate. If this is the case, The Daily Showwould
have a rather ambiguous status. Its position of democracy watchdog would be undermined, and
citizens would need a good amount of critical attitude when watching it.
In this paper, a relationship between exposure to The Daily Show, and more generally to late-nightpolitical satire (LNPS) will be investigated. A definition of political trust and LNPS will be given,
along with a theoretical discussion on the potential effects of LNPS on its viewers, relying on more
general theories about media exposure. Two hypothesis will be asserted, and one question about the
scope of these hypotheses will be asked. Then, results of 6 studies will be compared and discussed.
A concluding section will further discuss all the consequences of LNPS exposure, along with
conclusive remarks about the study, its significance, its limits, and its inclusion in a more general
research context.
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THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
Political trust an be defined as a basic evaluative orientation toward the government founded on
how well the government is operating according to people's normative expectations
(Hetherington
1998).
Recent research has shown that political trust has a very positive impact on the political
system. For instance, it facilitates the action of government and officials, and enables political
power to make changes (Hetherington 1998). Hence political distrust would worsen a more
dysfunctional political system.
Media exposure and negativity
It is then crucial to know what are the factors that potentially increase or decrease political trust.
One of them is media exposure. The impact of media on political socialization is well-known. It
considerably influences adolescents, and has a strong relationship with adult political participation
(Hoffman 2009). Therefore, one could expect that studying media effects is crucial to understand
the variations of political trust.
In 1976, Robinson coined the term
videomalaise
. According to him, television is
negative to democracy. Television is dictated by rankings and based on images, and therefore must
tell spectacular stories. Then television always focuses on the negative side of information, such as
scandals and catastrophes. This create an hostile environment in which everyone is antagonized and
suspected. As a result, distrust increases.
As of today, researchers tend to think that the relationship between trust and TV exposure
depends on the type of program watched, and its level of negativity (Guggenheim 2011). We can list
some signs, factors and symptoms of negativity. If a program is aggressive, such as CNNs defunct
debate program Crossfire, that assimilated politics to sport or spectacle, political trust tend to
decrease (Forgette 2006). The same can be seen when there is a large focus on personality traits
instead of policy issues (e.g. Brooks 2007).
What this means is that, when it comes to influence on political trust, all programs are not
equal. Therefore, it could be useful to detect the most negative programs to analyse their indirect
influence on democracy.
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Late-night political satire (LNPS)
One of the most salient example of negativity on television is late-night political satire (LNPS).
LNPS is today incarnated by two shows: The Daily Show(TDS) and its spin-off The Colbert Report
(TCR), broadcasted on weeknights on a comedy cable channel. TDS is a parody of a news bulletin,
while TCR is a parody of an opinion program hosted by a pundit such as The OReilly Factor.
This type of program tends, in general, to convey more negativity than other types. Unlike
opinion programs, satire attacks the political system indistinctly, and with less rules (usage of
personality traits, name-calling, heavy criticism of media, etc.). Because of its parodic nature and
the smaller place it allows to political promotion, satire is less casual than other late-night comedy
shows, such as The Tonight Show. Satire conveys more criticism than weekly programs such as
Saturday Night Live. Satire is almost instantaneous, and therefore harder. More generally, thespecificity of LNPS is its ressemblance to cable news programming, which inherently leads to
greater disobedience toward news media and the political system.
Therefore, LNPS is inherently different from other media types. It is also extremely popular.
Its audience doubled in 10 years (see Figure 1). Its cultural significance is vast (Kakutani 2008,
Baumgartner 2006). It has received scholar interest, with some researchers praying TDS as a
reinvention of political journalism (Baym 2005) or TCR as a notable philosophical method
(Schiller 2009). It is especially influential because its core audience is mostly young people (seeTable 1). Because media stimuli acquired at a young age have a structuring role in peoples political
dispositions, LNPS is a crucial media type to investigate.
Figure 1: Percentage of viewers of late-
night political satire
(Watch regularly or sometimes)
Source : Pew 2012
10
15
20
25
30
2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2012
The Daily ShowThe Colbert Report
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disillusioned about politics, and then less prone to manipulation. However, if political trust is a very
positive attitude for democracy (Hetherington 1998), LNPS could be a danger for democracy.
Researchers such as Hart (2007) have criticized LNPS for its political heresy and its
threat to democracy. According to them, LNPS implies that the political system can never be
reformed and changed, and that the best position is Jon Stewarts, defining his job as
throwing
spitballs at the back of the room (Kakutani 2008). LNPS could also oversimplify political matters.
Then, it would imply that dysfunctions in American political system would be due mainly to the
incompetence or the personality of politicians and not due to structural, more complex factors, or
due to the American people (Baumgartner 2006).
Therefore, one could see a decrease in political engagement, because viewers would tend to
interpret a joking, limited coverage of politics as real political messages. This is even more
concerning when it is known that LNPSis mostly watched by younger audiences, and that therefore
distrust could be a major element of their political socialization and their political learning
(Hoffman 2009). Therefore, if late-night political satire increases cynicism, does it trigger a
decrease in political engagement? More generally, is it bad to be cynical?
As any normative subject, it is complicated to draw an analysis that is both objective and
comprehensive. (One could for instance argue that an optimal democracy is not necessarily a
system in which turnout and peoples participation are maximal.) Therefore, the choice will be
made to limit the scope of this question to political participation and willingness to vote, since it isgenerally seen as a sign of a healthy democracy.
RQ1: If late-night political satire increases cynicism, does it trigger a decrease in political
participation?
This question is harder to answer, since only one study has dealt with the relationship between
LNPS, cynicism and political participation (Hoffman 2009). Its results will be presented in theresults section. In the conclusion, there will be a larger discussion on the other indirect effects that
LNPS can have on political participation.
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RESULTS
H1: Political trust
5 studies have addressed the subject. Among them, 3 tend to prove the hypothesis correct with
convincing evidence (Baumgartner 2006, Tsafti 2009, Guggenheim 2011).
Baumgartner & Morris (2006) used an experimental method. They worked on a sample of 732
college students (they justified this non-representativeness by the greater interest of studying the
effect of LNPS on younger people). Participants were divided in three groups. The first (n=245) was
exposed to a clip of TDS about the 2004 race between Bush and Kerry. The second (n=198) was
exposed to a clip of CBS Evening News coverage from the same date. The third (n=289) was not
exposed to any video. According to Baumgartner & Morris, the two clips shared a lot of common
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contents, and a same critical tone, because network campaign coverage is mainly the description of
mistakes of the contenders. The results presented here are based on the posttest survey.
The study shows that viewers of TDS have more negative views toward both candidates, and
especially toward the lesser-known candidate Kerry (see Table 2). Faith in American system (coded
by the sentence
I have faith in the U.S. electoral system
) is also lower when exposed to TDS.
Guggenheim, Kwak and Cambell (2011) conducted a more ambitious study than Baumgartner.
First of all, they made a distinction between distrust in politicians and systemic cynicism.
The first was coded by agreement with the following statements : Politicians dont realize how
badly they come across, Our elected leaders dont have very good personalities, Elected
officials dont tell us what they really think , Most politicians are corrupt , and Most
politicians can be trusted, which was reverse coded. The second was coded by Corruption is
always present in American politics and No matter which party is in power, it seems like our
government is run by a few big interests.
Secondly, they compared the effect of LNPS with other nontraditional news such as comedy
talk show (Late Night, The Tonight Show) ad cable opinion news (The OReilly Factor). The criteria
was frequent exposure to these shows They used 777 responses to a mail survey that come from a
representative sample of the US population.
Their results tend to partially confirm H1, since satirical news is significantly related to more
systemic cynicism, even though distrust in politicians is insignificantly correlated (see Table 3).
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Tsafti, Tukachinsky & Peri (2009) conducted their study in Isral after the Israli-Lebanon war,
which was a military defeat for Isrel, which failed to destroy Hezbollah, and showed the internal
weaknesses of Israeli political system and army. The regime experienced very low trust ratings,
therefore the researchers wanted to know if this was due to media exposure, and of which media
type.
They used a sample of 512 Israeli Jews contacted by telephone. Here, the show that was
studied wasEretz Nehederet, similar to The Daily Showwith a sensibly more vulgar tone. However,
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it is still late-night political satire. Political trust was here divided between the trust in political
parties and the government.
The results show that, even in Israel, political comedy has a significant negative effect on
political trust, contrary to talk shows for example (see Table 4). Therefore, the effects of political
satire are not only limited to a single country.
Two studies tend to contradict these findings.
Becker (2011) uses a posttest survey conducted in the wake of an experiment similar to
Baumgartners. The difference is that she compares satirical news to other humorous programs.
Political trust is measured by agreement to the sentence I trust the government to do what is
right
. LNPS was measured by habitual exposure to TDS and TCR.
Becker finds no support for a negative relationship, with a slight positive and insignificant
relation (Table 5).
La Marre (2013) uses an experiment. His (non-representative) sample was composed of 132
randomly chosen adults recruited through a jury pool. The sample was divided in 2x2 groups. The
first division was between persons which received some contextual information before viewing the
clips (high-ability) and persons who didnt (low-ability). The second division was between
exposure to a clip from CNNs Anderson Cooper 360 (AC360) and a clip from The Daily Show.
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Both concerned 2009 AIGs scandal, when AIG gave to its shareholders 90% of the amount of their
government bailout. Both clips were critical.
LaMarre finds that people with low-ability have a uniform approval of Congress. However,
when people have more ability, they tend to be more critical toward Congress after seeing the clip
of Anderson Cooper, and less critical after seeing The Daily Show (see figure 2). LaMarre argues
that it is due to the fact that people tend to discount Jon Stewarts arguments. This is contradictory
with previous findings.
There are two reasons that can let one think that theses studies have a limited significance, which
leads one to conclude that H1 is valid.
In the case of Becker, the results were just insignificant and werent really the proof of that
H1 is wrong. We can explain this statistical insignificance by the sample of the survey. For instance,
only 32% (~160 person) of the respondents were male, even though male is the core audience of
American LNPS. The size of the sample is therefore limited.
Figure 2: Ability by message interaction for
Congress Attitude
Source : La Marre 2013
1.5
2
2.5
3
3.5
Low ability High ability
Exposure to CNN Exposure to TDS
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In the case of LaMarre, it is likely that the big flaw of the study is the interaction between
the clip showed and question wording. What is noticeable in the clip used by LaMarre is that the1
blame or mockery goes on AIG, Ben Bernanke and Barack Obama. But the question asked to
measure political trust was the trust in Congress. However, in the clip, Congress is not mocked. The
only time Congress is mentioned is when a Senator blames Bernanke for its bailout plan. Moreover,
the AC360 clip explicitly blamed Congress. Therefore, as the study is an experiment, and then2
focused on the short-term reactions, it is not at all surprising that viewing The Daily Shows clip
was related to more Congress approval. Moreover, LaMarre doesnt say anything about the
significance of its results.
H2: Media trust
Baumgartner & al. (2006) also asked to the participants of their experiment their trust in news
media (= agreement to the sentence I trust the news media to cover political events fairly and
accurately). They find a strong very significant relationship between distrust and TDS exposure
(see Table 6).
The clip used by LaMarre can be seen at this address: http://thedailyshow.cc.com/videos/c9zg8f/the-1
notorious-aig---outrage.
The clip can be seen at this address : http://edition.cnn.com/video/?/video/politics/2009/03/20/2
ac.aig.bonus.cnn
http://thedailyshow.cc.com/videos/c9zg8f/the-notorious-aig---outragehttp://edition.cnn.com/video/?/video/politics/2009/03/20/ac.aig.bonus.cnn -
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Baumgartner & al also mention the Pew Media Consumption Study of 2004. Unlike their
experiment, this is a survey. The sentence to agree or disagree with is : often dont trust what
news organizations are saying . They find the same results of Baumgartners experiment
(youngsters are more likely to be cynical toward media when exposed to The Daily Show). (see
Table 7).
Guggenheim & al (2011) use a method very close to Pew (2004), since it is a survey and asks for
the habitual use of TDS. The statement they ask to agree or disagree with is: I trust the news
media to cover political events fairly and accurately.. The item was reverse coded.
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Guggenheim doesnt find enough evidence to support H2 (see Table 8). In general, seeing the
incremental R2, media use hasnt much impact on media mistrust.
We could infer that the effect of TDS on media trust really depends on the age, and the
relationship is stronger for younger people. This would be consistent with the results of Pew (2004).
Guggenheim & al. actually find this when investigating the interaction between media use and age.
If an individual is older and watches satirical news, one actually trusts more the media.
Guggenheim finds the same thing when an individual is more partisan (see Table 9).
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RQ1: LNPS exposure and political participation
Hoffman & Thomson (2009) use data from a survey conducted with 517 high-school students. They
investigate the mediating effect of cynicism. Namely, they try to know if there is an indirect link
between TDS exposure and political participation via the variation of cynicism. Since political
participation is impossible for high-school students, they measured civic participation such as
extracurricular activities. Cynicism was measured with sentences such as Elected officials almost
never keep campaign promises.
The study doesnt find anything. The coefficients are extremely low and the results are not
significant (see Table 10).
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CONCLUSIVE REMARKS
The results are consistent with the hypothesis H1. In general, exposure to LNPS triggers political
distrust. This is a general, verified effect. Two studies that apparently contradict these findings have
some methodological flaws that limit their significance.
Even though this subject hasnt been raised, it is worth noting that the effects of LNPS on
cynicism are stronger for those who are less experienced with political satire: stronger effects of a
Daily Show clip for people who dont usually watch TDS (Baumgartner 2006), stronger effects of
Daily Showuse for people who dont also read newspapers (Guggenheim 2011).
However, though LNPS targets news media as well, we dont find any evidence of a uniform
relationship between media mistrust and exposure to LNPS. (H2) This relationship is more
complex. Some are more likely to be influenced. Youngsters, as well as less-educated, less partisan
citizens are more prone to mistrust the media, after having watched LNPS.
RQ1 has no real answer, since the results of Hoffman & al (2009) are insignificant and likely show
a very weak link. However, we can find elements of answers in other studies about LNPS, even
though they havent dealt with the matter of political trust. The consequences of exposure to LNPS
are diverse. Therefore, a large number of factors influence the characteristics of a
good citizen
.
LNPS is positively related to political attentiveness (Cao 2010), political knowledge, as well as
political expression (Becker 2013). Moreover, internal efficacy, which is beliefs about ones own
competence to understand, and to participate effectively in, politics (Baumgartner 2006), is also
closely related to political participation, and it appears that it has a positive mediating effect
(Hoffman 2009, 2011).
Therefore, it would be really useful to understand the link between the cognitive
phenomenons triggered by LNPS. For instance, the interaction between LNPS exposure, cynicism
and political participation has been investigated (Hoffman 2009). But the interaction between LNPS
exposure, cynicism and internal efficacy has not. Viewers tend to feel more knowledgable about
politics after watching LNPS: if viewers have more cognitive control over politics, could it decrease
cynicism?
***
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We could infer from this study that LNPS is a danger for democracy because it increases cynicism.
But this assertion would be contestable.
1. LNPS has a bunch of positive political effects that have to be balanced with cynicism increase.
2. The main problem with LNPS is when people tend to replace hard news use with it, therefore
tending to consider LNPS as their sole source of information. However, even for youngsters,
this is only seldom the case (Young 2006). Moreover, the political significance of LNPS tend to
be discounted (LaMarre 2013).
3. Cynicism is not bad in every case. There is still no overwhelming support for the hypotheses
that cynicism leads to less political participation (Baumgartner 2006). Political trust can be
defined, according to Easton, between support to the political authorities and the political
system (Easton 1975). Therefore, trust can be directed toward the politicians, the news media,
or the system. This distinction is made by some researchers (Guggenheim 2011, Baumgartner
2006), but not by others. Therefore, it is still difficult to measure the significance and the
consequences of political mistrust as triggered by LNPS.
Word count: 3 496
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