Influences on Public Opinion
Many factors affect public opinion:
- Politicians: Many officials actively campaign to generate support among the public. They give speeches and interviews, stage rallies, and listen to constituents.
- Media: The news media covers all major political events extensively. Indeed, sometimes it seems that the media creates important political events by choosing to cover them so much. Because the vast majority of people get their political information from the media, it has a huge impact.
- Socioeconomic status: Most political and economic events affect people unevenly, so one’s social and economic status naturally affects one’s views. Wealthy people are more likely than poor people to support a budget that cuts taxes on capital gains, for example, because they would benefit more from the tax cut.
- Major events: Any significant event—a war, an economic downturn, or a diplomatic success, for example—can influence people’s views.
Example: In the United States, whenever a foreign crisis arises, support for the president shoots up dramatically. Political scientists call this increase in popularity the rally ’round the flag effect. The effect might not always last a long time, but in the short run, the president’s popularity goes up.
- Opinion leaders: Political scientists call a person whose views on an issue can affect the views of others an opinion leader. Often, opinion leaders are prominent members of the community and pay more attention to politics than most people.
Example: The Internet has created a new type of opinion leader called a blogger (short for web logger). Many people read the same political blogs every day and are strongly influenced by what they read. Politicians have begun to court bloggers, going so far as to invite them to conventions and to grant them interviews in an attempt to win the opinion leaders over to their side.
Media Saturation
In the last twenty years, the media has become a bigger part of our lives. Twenty-four-hour news networks allow people to tune in any time. At the same time, the networks must find something to fill all those hours—and to outdo one another—so the networks often seek sensational stories. Talk radio has also become extremely popular. Many people rely on talk radio for much of their news, even though many talk radio hosts are openly partisan. Escaping the media often seems impossible: There always seems to be a television, radio, or Internet stream playing in the background of our daily lives.