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In 1976, journalist Barbara
Walters became the first female coanchor on a network news show,
The ABC Evening News . She was met with great hostility from her coanchor Harry Reasoner and received critical coverage from the press.
Barbara Walters, “Ms. Walters Reflects,”
Vanity Fair , 31 May 2008, On newspaper staffs, women reported having to fight for assignments to well-published
beat
s , or to be assigned areas or topics, such as the economy or politics, that were normally reserved for male journalists. Once female journalists held these assignments, they feared writing about women’s issues. Would it make them appear weak? Would they be taken from their coveted beats?
Mills. “What Difference Do Women Journalists Make?” This apprehension allowed poor coverage of women and the women’s movement to continue until women were better represented as journalists and as editors. Strength of numbers allowed them to be confident when covering issues like health care, childcare, and education.
Mills. “What Difference Do Women Journalists Make?”
The Center for American Women in Politics researches the treatment women receive from both government and the media, and they share the data with the public.
The media’s historically uneven coverage of women continues in its treatment of female candidates. Early coverage was sparse. The stories that did appear often discussed the candidate’s viability, or ability to win, rather than her stand on the issues.
Kahn and Goldenberg, “The Media: Obstacle or Ally of Feminists?” Women were seen as a novelty rather than as serious contenders who needed to be vetted and discussed. Modern media coverage has changed slightly. One study found that female candidates receive more favorable coverage than in prior generations, especially if they are incumbents.
Kim Fridkin Kahn. 1994. “Does Gender Make a Difference? An Experimental Examination of Sex Stereotypes and Press Patterns in Statewide Campaigns,”
American Journal of Political Science 38, No. 1: 162–195. Yet a different study found that while there was increased coverage for female candidates, it was often negative.
John David Rausch, Mark Rozell, and Harry L. Wilson. 1999. “When Women Lose: A Study of Media Coverage of Two Gubernatorial Campaigns,”
Women&Politics 20, No. 4: 1–22. And it did not include Latina candidates.
Sarah Allen Gershon. 2013. “Media Coverage of Minority Congresswomen and Voter Evaluations: Evidence from an Online Experimental Study,”
Political Research Quarterly 66, No. 3: 702–714. Without coverage, they are less likely to win.
The historically negative media coverage of female candidates has had another concrete effect: Women are less likely than men to run for office. One common reason is the effect negative media coverage has on families.
Jennifer Lawless and Richard Logan Fox. 2005.
It Takes a Candidate: Why Women Don’t Run for Office .
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Many women do not wish to expose their children or spouses to criticism.
Brittany L. Stalsburg, “Running with Strollers: The Impact of Family Life on Political Ambition,”
Eagleton Institute of Politics , Spring 2012, Unpublished Paper, http://www.eagleton.rutgers.edu/research/documents/Stalsburg-FamilyLife-Political-Ambition.pdf (August 28, 2015). In 2008, the nomination of Sarah
Palin as Republican candidate John McCain’s running mate validated this concern (
[link] ). Some articles focused on her qualifications to be a potential future president or her record on the issues. But others questioned whether she had the right to run for office, given she had young children, one of whom has developmental disabilities.
Christina Walker, “Is Sarah Palin Being Held to an Unfair Standard?”
CNN , 8 September 2008. Her daughter, Bristol, was criticized for becoming pregnant while unmarried.
Dana Bash, “Palin’s Teen Daughter is Pregnant,”
CNN , 1 September 2008. Her husband was called cheap for failing to buy her a high-priced wedding ring.
Jimmy Orr, “Palin Wardrobe Controversy Heightens - Todd is a Cheapo!”
Christian Science Monitor , 26 October 2008. Even when candidates ask that children and families be off-limits, the press rarely honors the requests. So women with young children may wait until their children are grown before running for office, if they choose to run at all.
Writers began to formally study media bias in the 1920s. Initially, the press was seen as being able to place information in our minds, but later research found that the media have a minimal effect on recipients. A more recent theory is that the media cultivates our reality by presenting information that creates our perceptions of the world. The media does have the ability to frame what it presents, and it can also prime citizens to think a particular way, which changes how they react to new information.
The media’s coverage of electoral candidates has increasingly become analysis rather than reporting. Sound bites from candidates are shorter. The press now provides horse-race coverage on the campaigns rather than in-depth coverage on candidates and their positions, forcing voters to look for other sources, like social media, for information. Current coverage of the government focuses more on what the president does than on presidential policies. Congress, on the other hand, is rarely affected by the media. Most topics discussed by the media are already being discussed by members of Congress or its committees.
The media frame discussions and choose pictures, information, and video to support stories, which may affect the way people vote on social policy and in elections.
Baum, Matthew A. 2003. Soft News Goes to War: Public Opinion and American Foreign Policy in the New Media Age . Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Baum, Matthew A., and Philip B. K. Potter. 2015. War and Democratic Constraint: How the Public Influences Foreign Policy . Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Cohen, Jeffrey. 2008. The Presidency in the Era of 24-Hour News . Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Eshbaugh-Soha, Matthew, and Jeffrey Peake. 2011. Breaking through the Noise: Presidential Leadership, Public Opinion, and the News . Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
Fellow, Anthony R. 2013. American Media History . Boston: Cengage.
Graber, Doris A., and Johanna L. Dunaway. 2014. Mass Media and American Politics . Thousand Oaks, CA: CQ Press.
PIyengar, Shanto. 2016. Media Politics: A Citizen’s Guide , 3rd ed. New York: W. W. Norton.
Iyengar, Shanto, and Donald R. Kinder. 2010. News That Matters: Television and American Opinion . Chicago: University Of Chicago Press.
Lawless, Jennifer L., and Richard L. Fox. 2010. It Still Takes A Candidate: Why Women Don’t Run for Office . Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Malecha, Gary, and Daniel J. Reagan. 2011. The Public Congress: Congressional Deliberation in a New Media Age . New York: Routledge.
Media Matters (http://mediamatters.org/).
Media Research Center (http://www.mrc.org/).
Patterson, Thomas. 2013. Informing the News: The Need for Knowledge-Based Journalism . New York: Vintage.
Politifact (http://www.politifact.com/).
Rozell, Mark, and Jeremy Mayer. 2008. Media Power, Media Politics . Lanham, MD: Rowman&Littlefield.
West, Darrell M. 2013. Air Wars . Thousand Oaks, CA: CQ Press.
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