On May 9, 2011, at 7:41 PM, Jim Clark wrote: > >>> Rick Froman <[email protected]> 10-May-11 4:51 AM >>>
It's interesting to me how people with very different political ideologies will look at the same television show and interpret it in ways consistent with their beliefs. About a year (or so) ago, a colleague of mine brought a paper by LaMarre, Landreville, and Beam (2009) to my attention. Here's the abstract: "This study investigated biased message processing of political satire in The Colbert Report and the influence of political ideology on perceptions of Stephen Colbert. Results indicate that political ideology influences biased processing of ambiguous political messages and source in late-night comedy. Using data from an experiment (N = 332), we found that individual-level political ideology significantly predicted perceptions of Colbert’s political ideology. Additionally, there was no significant difference between the groups in thinking Colbert was funny, but conservatives were more likely to report that Colbert only pretends to be joking and genuinely meant what he said while liberals were more likely to report that Colbert used satire and was not serious when offering political statements. Conservatism also significantly predicted perceptions that Colbert disliked liberalism. Finally, a post hoc analysis revealed that perceptions of Colbert’s political opinions fully mediated the relationship between political ideology and individual-level opinion." The authors referred to another interesting article by Vidmar and Rokeach (1974), which they (i.e., LaMarre, et al.) summarized as follows: "This study examined whether audiences would interpret the lead character, a parodied bigot named Archie Bunker, as a negative role-model. The study found that individuals who identified with the character’s conservative nature and agreed with his political views held favorable perceptions of the character and believed Archie Bunker articulated legitimate viewpoints. However, individuals with low character identification and opposing political views held unfavorable perceptions. Of particular interest in this study is that individuals who identified with Bunker’s socio- political views were not influenced by the director’s negative framing of the character, while those who did not identify with Bunker’s political viewpoint reported attitudes and perceptions consistent with the negative framing of this television character." (p. 5) Best, Jeff REFERENCES: LaMarre, H. L., Landreville, K. D., & Beam, M. A. (2009). The irony of satire: Political ideology and the motivation to see what you want to see in The Colbert Report. International Journal of Press/Politics, 14, 212-231. [A pdf of the paper can be found here: http://www.democracynow.org/resources/63/263/The_Irony_of_Satire.pdf] Vidmar, Neil, and Milton Rokeach. 1974. “Archie Bunker’s Bigotry: A Study in Selective Perception and Exposure.” Journal of Communication 24, 36–47. -- --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Jeffry Ricker, Ph.D. SCC: Professor of Psychology MCCCD: General Studies Faculty Representative CV: http://www.scottsdalecc.edu/ricker/curriculum_vitae.html PSY 101: http://www.scottsdalecc.edu/ricker/psy101/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Scottsdale Community College 9000 E. Chaparral Road Scottsdale, AZ 85256-2626 Office: SB-123 Phone: (480) 423-6213 Fax: (480) 423-6298 --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [email protected]. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=10509 or send a blank email to leave-10509-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
