Media Influence and Spatial Voting: The Role of Perceived Party Positions

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Paper Summary

Conflicts of Interest

Identified Weaknesses

Rating Explanation

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Paper Summary

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Less Sun, More Labour: How a Tabloid Boycott Shifted Votes in Liverpool

This quasi-experiment investigated the long-term effects of reduced exposure to right-wing media using the Liverpool boycott of The Sun newspaper. Lower working class residents in Liverpool, who were the most affected by the boycott, were more likely to perceive the Labour party as moderate, adopt left-leaning positions on union power, and vote for the Labour party compared to similar groups in other parts of Northern England who continued reading The Sun.

Possible Conflicts of Interest

None identified.

Identified Weaknesses

Missing data on salience

The data does not include questions about issue salience, which is a mediator in the spatial model. This limits the analysis of the mediating role of issue salience.

Limitations of quasi-experimental design

The quasi-experimental design cannot be used for formal mediation analysis because of missing data and endogeneity concerns. This limits the ability to determine the specific mechanisms through which media exposure affects voting behavior.

Limited generalizability of control group

The control group is restricted to Northern English respondents, which might not fully capture the counterfactual scenario. The results may not be generalizable to other regions with different socio-economic contexts and political cleavages.

Measurement limitations in BSA data

The BSA survey data has limitations due to missing data for certain years, and variations in question wording and response scales. This may affect the accuracy and reliability of measurements for the mediators.

Rating Explanation

This study uses a strong quasi-experimental design to analyze the complex relationship between media and voting. The use of the Liverpool Sun boycott provides a unique opportunity to address endogeneity concerns that plague observational studies on media effects. The study finds significant and substantively important effects of media exposure on perceived party positions, ideological positions, and voting behavior, thus contributing valuable insights to our understanding of media influence. Although formal mediation analysis was limited due to data constraints, the results suggest a potentially powerful mediating role of perceived party positions. Some limitations include the restricted geographic scope of the treatment, the reliance on survey data, and the inability to fully test mediation.

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