Thursday, February 10, 2011
Left is Mean but Right is Meaner, Says New Study of Political Discourse
While the tragic shooting in Arizona has spotlighted the vitriol that seems to pervade political commentary, objective research examining the scope of this disturbing phenomenon has been lacking.
In the first published study of its kind, social scientists at Tufts University’s School of Arts and Sciences have found that outrage talk is endemic among commentators of all political stripes, but measurably worse on the political right, and is more prevalent than it was even during the turmoil of the war in Viet Nam and the Watergate scandal.
In their study, Tufts Assistant Professor of Sociology Sarah Sobieraj and Professor of Political Science Jeffrey Berry systematically scrutinized what they call “outrage talk” in leading talk radio, cable news analysis, political blogs and newspaper columns. Their findings, “From Incivility to Outrage: Political Discourse in Blogs, Talk Radio, and Cable News,” appears in the February 2011 issue of the journal Political Communication, available online February 8.
The term “outrage talk” refers to a form of political discourse involving efforts to provoke visceral responses, such as anger, righteousness, fear or moral indignation, through the use of overgeneralizations, sensationalism, misleading or patently inaccurate information, ad hominem attacks and partial truths about opponents.
The Tufts scientists’ analysis of both ideologically conservative and liberal content revealed that outrage talk, often infused with hateful terminology and imagery, is pervasive, not just an occasional emotional eruption.
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