Paper Topic:

how far can experimental techniques go in helping us understand the nature of contemporary media-politics relations?

Angoli 07 .11 .2007

Experimental Research Method in Politics and Media

Change is a rapid phenomenon in our contemporary world . The need to adapt to these changes has necessitated some new inventions in almost all fields . These inventions include the formulation of new policies and ideologies

Politicians and journalist have not been left behind in this rat race The success of the novel policies and ideologies that that are devised by politicians , either in or out of governments , is directly hinged on their (policies or ideologies ) popularity in the eyes of

the public They also determine if a political party will have a competitive edge in terms of attracting the electorates . Politicians therefore , are always in need to know how the public or the electorate for that matter is responding to the new policies and /or ideologies

In , Handbook of Political Communication , Lynda Lee Kaid talks of political marketing as the application of marketing principles and procedures in political campaigns by individuals and organizations . The procedure of which involve analyzing , development , execution and management of strategic campaigns by candidates , political parties government , lobbyists and interest groups that seek to drive public opinion , advance ideologies , win elections , pass legislations and referenda in response to needs and wants of selected people and groups in a society . Political marketing involve many concepts and theories that have been used traditionally for non-profit organizations in selling of goods and services to customers . This selection highlights the application of these same procedures to political market places where candidates , government officials and political parties use these techniques to drive public opinion in a desired direction (18

On the other hand , to keep up with the competition for audiences media houses are constantly designing new programs . The media establishments therefore , conduct studies to understand how a particular audience would conduct studies to get an insight into how particular audiences identifies , for instance , emotionally or spiritually , to different types of media content and also how they take in the content of such programs .This research is what Barrie Gunter describes in his book , Media Research Methods : Measurement Audiences , Reactions and Impact , Barrie Gunter , as academic effective research . Media practitioners also carry out studies to serve as a routine measurement of audiences ' appreciation of media content and to established novel measurement systems . These are called industry-driven research ( 136

Knowledge is crucial in any process of decision making . This is because making informed decisions goes a long way to determine the success of any endeavor . In-depth knowledge about an issue is achieved through research . This discuss is an elaborate analysis of the experimental techniques of research as employed by the media and politicians to verify the feasibility of their , programs , policies or ideologies

Experimental Research Method : Strengths and Weaknesses

The experimental research is an old approach in mass media research . And even up to date it continues to avail a wealth of information for researchers and critics of the media . Roger Wimmer and Joseph Dominick allude to this fact in their...

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