Page 262 - Culture Society and the Media

252 POLITICAL EFFECTS

Table 3: Respondents’ views as to whether or not Congressmen lose touch with constituents
after election

Source: Robinson (1976)

system…. But once these individuals have passed this initial stage they
enter a second phase in which personal denigration continues and in which
a new hostility toward politics and government also emerges. Having
passed through both stages of political cynicism, these uniquely susceptible
individuals pass their cynicism along to those who were at the start less
attuned to television messages and consequently less directly vulnerable to
television malaise. (Robinson, 1976, p. 99)

To test this diagnosis Robinson re-analysed data from a nationwide survey of
American voters interviewed during the 1968 Presidential election campaign.
The respondents were divided into three groups; those relying on media other
than television for following political affairs; those relying primarily on
television and those relying only on television for following politics. The extent
of agreement with several statements expressing trust or mistrust in American
political institutions was compared for members of each group. Table 3 presents
an example of this work, based on responses to the statement: ‘Generally
speaking, those we elect to Congress in Washington lose touch with the people
pretty quickly’.
The top part of the Table does in fact show more mistrust among those relying
on television to follow political affairs than among those who do not rely on
television. The same pattern holds in the rest of the Table, where the data have