The Dynamics of Public Attention: Agenda-Setting Theory Meets Big Data
2014/03/26 by W. Russell Neuman, Lauren Guggenheim, S. Mo Jang +2 · 622 citations
Physics and Astronomy · Psychology · Social Sciences · #Big data #Communication #Communication theory #Computer science #Data science #Dynamics (music) #Electoral Systems and Political Participation #Framing (construction) #Opinion Dynamics and Social Influence #Political science #Politics #Psychology #Social Media and Politics #Social media #World Wide Web
paper · pdf · doi:10.1111/jcom.12088
published in Journal of Communication 64(2), 193-214 (Oxford University Press)
openalex publication_date 2014/03/26 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/04
Abstract
Researchers have used surveys and experiments to better understand communication dynamics, but confront consistent distortion from self-report data. But now both digital exposure and resulting expressive behaviors (such as tweets) are potentially accessible for direct analysis with important ramifications for the formulation of communication theory. We utilize “big data” to explore attention and framing in the traditional and social media for 29 political issues during 2012. We find agenda setting for these issues is not a one-way pattern from traditional media to a mass audience, but rather a complex and dynamic interaction. Although the attentional dynamics of traditional and social media are correlated, evidence suggests that the rhythms of attention in each respond to a significant degree to different drummers.
Citations
Cited by
- Rethinking Political Communication in a Time of Disrupted Public Spheres
- Time to #Protest: Selective Exposure, Cascading Activation, and Framing in Social Media
- Where Is Capitalism? Unmasking Its Hidden Role in Psychology
- Crossing lines for laughs: Racial stereotyping and social identity in r/RoastMe
- Misperceptions of Public Opinion During Crises: Evidence from the COVID-19 Pandemic
- Countering the “Climate Cult” – Framing Cascades in Far-Right Digital Networks
- Swearing Effects on Citizen-to-Citizen Commenting Online
- Comparing Disaster News on Twitter and Television: an Intermedia Agenda Setting Perspective
- Culture, Paradigm, and Communication Theory: A Matter of Boundary or Commensurability?
- Election Campaigning on Social Media: Politicians, Audiences, and the Mediation of Political Communication on Facebook and Twitter
- Political Astroturfing on Twitter: How to Coordinate a Disinformation Campaign
- The New Personal Influence: How Our Facebook Friends Influence the News We Read
- Discovering the world’s most endangered great whale species did not advance an issue-attention cycle in news media: Implications for Rice’s whale conservation and management
- Network Issue Agenda Setting on Facebook: Exploring the Interplay Between Polarized Campaigns and Party Supporters
- Demystifying hashtag hijacking in the public opinion game: attention, narratives, and social bots
- ‘What they’re not telling you about ChatGPT’: exploring the discourse of AI in UK news media headlines
- Point process analysis of geographical diffusion of news in Argentina
- ‘Limited container’ or ‘Rubik’s cube’: re-evaluating attention relationships among sub-topics in online scientific discussions on social media
- From Questionable Incident to Political Scandal
- Social media and moral panics: Assessing the effects of technological change on societal reaction
- Attention dynamics on the Chinese social media Sina Weibo during the COVID-19 pandemic
- Quantifying time-dependent Media Agenda and public opinion by topic modeling
- Public Response to Scientific Misconduct: Assessing Changes in Public Sentiment Toward the Stimulus-Triggered Acquisition of Pluripotency (STAP) Cell Case via Twitter. [europepmc]
- The Effect of Corporate Social Responsibility and Public Attention on Innovation Performance: Evidence from High-polluting Industries. [europepmc]
- Food Safety Incident, Public Health Concern, and Risk Spillover Heterogeneity: Avian Influenza Shocks as Natural Experiments in China's Consumer Markets. [europepmc]
- Around the world in 60 days: an exploratory study of impact of COVID-19 on online global news sentiment. [europepmc]
- Attention dynamics on the Chinese social media Sina Weibo during the COVID-19 pandemic. [europepmc]
- Framing of and Attention to COVID-19 on Twitter: Thematic Analysis of Hashtags. [europepmc]
- Diverging from News Media: An Exploratory Study on the Changing Dynamics between Media and Public Attention on Cancer in China from 2011-2020. [europepmc]
- The Relationship between Government Information Supply and Public Information Demand in the Early Stage of COVID-19 in China-An Empirical Analysis. [europepmc]
- The Mutual Influence of the World Health Organization (WHO) and Twitter Users During COVID-19: Network Agenda-Setting Analysis. [europepmc]
- Information sharing practices during the COVID-19 pandemic: A case study about face masks. [europepmc]
- Public Social Media Discussions on Agricultural Product Safety Incidents: Chinese African Swine Fever Debate on Weibo. [europepmc]
- Can people hear others' crying?: A computational analysis of help-seeking on Weibo during COVID-19 outbreak in China. [europepmc]
- A Mixed Approach for Aggressive Political Discourse Analysis on Twitter. [europepmc]
- A comparison between online social media discussions and vaccination rates: A tale of four vaccines. [europepmc]
- Exposure to negative foreign COVID-19 news predicts lower support for immigration policy in China. [europepmc]
- Predictive analysis and correlational exploration of public and academic attention in secondary vocational education. [europepmc]
- Gaining a better understanding of online polarization by approaching it as a dynamic process. [europepmc]
- Social media crisis communication and public engagement during COVID-19 analyzing public health and news media organizations' tweeting strategies. [europepmc]
- Media channels and the secondary transfer effect: influences on willingness to interact with Asian international students in Japan mediated by outgroup morality perception. [europepmc]
- Discovering the world's most endangered great whale species did not advance an issue-attention cycle in news media: Implications for Rice's whale conservation and management. [europepmc]
Related