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The Effects of Media Interpretation for Citizen Evaluations of Politicians' Messages

Although politicians prefer to communicate directly with the public, political sound bites in the nightly news are shrinking and primetime presidential press conferences are becoming increasingly uncommon. Instead, people primarily receive the messages of politicians as interpreted by journalists. What are the consequences of this interpretation for how citizens evaluate political messages? This article compares how people evaluate mediated political accounts and those delivered by politicians directly. Using a set of experiments, this article considers whether the power of politicians to inform and persuade people is limited or enhanced through the interpretation of journalists. This article finds that although people respond similarly to message content, whether from the politicians or from the media, evaluations of the message source and political processes are improved when politicians communicate directly with the public.