HOW A HIGH CHOICE MEDIA ENVIRONMENT LEADS

TO GREATER SELECTIVITY, FRAGMENTATION AND

POLARIZATION
BY REBECCA CHALIF
APRIL 25, 2010

Abstract:
This paper analyzes how the proliferation of new media has
created a high choice media environment, and how this
environment has led to media fragmentation and ultimately
increased political polarization. Before the advent of talk radio,
cable news channels, and most recently, the Internet, citizens
received a relatively consistent news package. This fostered a
common collective intelligence among the citizenry where people
were exposed to all types of news from varying perspectives.
Today however, there are so many different places people can
go to consume the news that a degree of personal selectivity is
always present. People can filter their news intake to exclude
topics they are not interested in, ideologies they do not agree
with, or political news all together. This selectivity has led to
media fragmentation- the idea that each person will likely
consume different fragments of news content. This paper
employs a statistical analysis to show the relationship between
peoples political ideology and the media outlet they chose to rely
on. This study analyzes the frequency of peoples television and
Internet consumption of two partisan news outlets- Fox News
and MSNBC, and compares it to their reported political ideology.

The results support the hypothesis that peoples political

ideology is related to the type of news they chose to consume.
The data shows that people who are conservative consume
news from Fox News more frequently than those who are liberal.
The opposite trend is found with respect to MSNBC, as liberals
gravitate to this outlet more frequently than conservatives. These
results support the idea that people chose media that agrees
with their pre-existing political ideology, and that ignoring news
that supports the opposite ideology is likely to increase
polarization and political partisanship.

The emergence of new media and the rise of novel media outlets
have vastly changed the media environment, providing
audiences with countless options for news consumption. This
extremely high choice environment will undoubtedly have some
major implications with respect to political news (Hindman,
2009). Before the advent of talk radio, cable news channels, and
most recently, the Internet, local newspapers and evening news
broadcasts served as the primary outlets for political news. As a
result, there was a commonality to the news people consumed
regardless of their geographic location, issue positions, or
ideological stance.
Today, people can choose from thousands of news outlets, each
producing a different news product. The Internet alone provides

news consumers with an enormous array of websites that

provide varying types of news (Hindman, 2009). Citizens also
have the opportunity to cater their news intake to cover only
issues that interest them, or perhaps, to only expose themselves
to political information that supports their point of view (Sunstein,
2007). This notion of media selectivity may have harmful effects
on a collective civic intelligence that is paramount for a nation
governed by the people. If citizens only encounter political
news that reinforces their preconceived notions, compromise will
become increasingly difficult, and people may not be aware of
the alternate perspectives of a political issue. If political news
ceases to educate citizens by providing multiple perspectives,
and instead, becomes an echo chamber for like-minded
individuals to share their similar perspectives, it is likely that the
result will be an increasingly polarized citizenry (Jamieson, &
Cappella, 2008). Therefore, I hypothesize that an analysis of
news media consumption will show that people are more likely to
select news outlets that reflect their preconceived political
preferences. This relationship will be analyzed by comparing
peoples political ideology with how often they watch, listen, or
visit the websites of the conservative leaning news outlet, Fox
News, and the liberal leaning MSNBC.
The existing literature on media fragmentation and its polarizing
effects, answers many of the important preliminary questions

relevant to this study. Previous research sheds a great deal of

light on the implications of the new media environment, and how
it relates to increased polarization among American citizens. I will
use the theoretical framework provided by the literature below to
explain and support my hypothesis, stating that people will
gravitate toward media that echoes their political ideologies, and
thus show how a high choice media environment will lead to
greater media selectivity and ultimately, greater political
polarization.

High Choice Media Environment

Today, it is clear that media consumers have far more news
choices. Markus Prior emphasizes this drastic shift when he
points out that in 1970, television provided a mere seven
channels to the average household and that the three broadcast
networks captured 80% of all viewing. In comparison, by 2005,
85% of households had access to cable or satellite television
providing the average viewer with about 100 channels to chose
from (Prior, 2005). However, this data does not take into
consideration the massive proliferation of new media outlets on
the Internet. Online, people can access a plethora of information,
some of which may be affiliated with a major news organization,
but much of which is citizen-produced content in the form of
blogs and message boards. New media outlets such as these
provide consumers with the broadest possible sampling of

peoples opinions on almost any topic. The old media

environment of limited choice seemed to encourage moderation
and conformity (Jones, 2001). It was reasonable for citizens to
read their daily newspaper and watch a one-hour evening news
report- creating an environment where most citizens were
exposed to the same news.
Today, new media sources such as cable television, talk radio,
and the Internet, have begun to lure people away from the
traditional mainstream media. This shift has led to an increase in
niche media, where news outlets no longer attempt to catch the
broadest possible audience by offending nobody, but rather,
focus on a smaller, more targeted audience with perspectives
that are likely to offend many (Jones, 2001). Unencumbered by
many of the constraints of objectivity and fairness, common to
mainstream media organizations (Davis, & Owen, 1998), some
media outlets have moved more toward sensationalism and bias
as a means of maintaining a large market share. The new media
environment, consisting of countless possible outlets, as well as
a much larger range of opinions, forces consumers to chose
which of these outlets they will use for information gathering
(Baum, & Groeling, 2008). As it is impossible to expose ones
self to all possible media sources, people must have some basis
for distinguishing and choosing their preferred media outlets.

This notion leads to an important element of this studymedia

selectivity and fragmentation.

Media Selectivity & Fragmentation

Selectivity can occur at several distinct junctures during mass
media consumption. Diana Mutz describes these junctures
as exposure to a particular source of news, attention to what the
source says, and biasedinterpretation when processing the
content of the news (Mutz, 2006). For the purposes of this study,
I will focus my analysis on selective exposure, as this step must
happen before the other two types of selectivity can occur. Media
selectivity can be understood by considering what Cass Sunstein
calls, The Daily Me (Sunstein, 2007). His book describes the
phenomenon correlated with high media choice, coupled with the
extreme ease of access to information. Instead of relying on a
mediating institution, such as a newspaper or a television
channel, people now serve as their own news aggregators (Lee,
2009). They can pick and choose what content to read over an
ever expanding media sphere that includes information on
every topic, presented from almost every point of view.
Considering that every citizen could be her own personal news
aggregator, it becomes likely that no two people would receive
the same news package on any given day.
There are two types of media selectivity that are relevant to this
study. The first is the selection of news content and the second is

the selection of entertainment and other non-news content. This

distinction is important, as it shows how the new, high-choice
media environment can facilitate either an inundation of news
content, or a complete avoidance of it. A citizen interested in the
news now has the opportunity to access large amounts of
information. These citizens gain a much more holistic
understanding of a news story by following its coverage across a
range of media outlets with different perspectives and
contributions to the story. For example, a political junkie can
follow any story, from the most hyper-local to the most
international. They can see many journalistic perspectives on the
issue at hand, as well as view the opinions of other citizens
blogging or commenting on news stories. This scenario seems
like an idyllic model for what Michael Schudson calls the
informed citizen (Schudson, 1998). He proposes that good
citizens must be educated about the issues in order to properly
self-govern. However, one must also consider the possibility of
the other extreme. A person with no interest in politics or news
has other media options, in that they can avoid almost all political
messages. In comparison, 40 years ago, a politically
uninterested person would still experience a good deal of
political messages through accidental exposure, as there were
often few, if any, alternatives in the media (Prior, 2005). Even in
an increasingly polarized society, there is still a large center of
voters who are indifferent or ambivalent toward politics

(Bernhardt, Krasa, & Polborn, 2008). The idea that this group
can completely detach from the political world is unsettling at
best, and detrimental to the functioning of our democracy at
worst. Prior explains, Since political knowledge is an important
predictor of turnout and since exposure to political information
motivates turnout, the shift from a low-choice to a high-choice
media environment implies changes in electoral participation as
well (Prior, 2005). Highlighting this point, Mutz points out that
the average size of the audience watching prime-time
presidential addresses and news conferences has steadily
decreased in the late 20th century (Mutz, 2006). Clearly,
selectivity leads to fragmentation of peoples news packages,
widening the gap between the informed and the unin
formed citizen (Tewksbury, 2005).
Another measure of media fragmentation that is of paramount
importance to this study is selectivity based on political ideology.
It is not surprising, that with so many options, a persons media
choices increasingly reflect their partisan considerations.
Evidence suggests that people tend to seek out information
consistent with their own beliefs. This body of evidence can be
traced back to some of the first studies on selective exposure
from the 1940s. Paul Lazarsfeld linked his work to a
psychological study by Leon Festinger on the theory of cognitive

dissonance. Festinger suggested, that people want to avoid

information that conflicts with their preexisting beliefs, and that
they seek out informationthrough activities such as selective
exposurethat confirms their current beliefs (Mutz, 2006).
Accordingly, a more recent study showed that the stronger a
persons partisan affiliations, the more likely they are to select
media outlets that confirmed their beliefs (Iyengar, & Hahn,
2007). A study of self-reported media exposure during the 2000
and 2004 campaigns showed significant fragmentation of media
use among Republicans and Democrats. Republicans gravitated
toward talk radio, a medium known to have a conservative slant;
while Democrats avoided talk radio and watched television
newsmagazines and late-night entertainment, two predominantly
liberal media outlets (Iyengar, & Hahn, 2007). Another supporting
study found that individuals political predispositions could predict
their exposure to specific media (Lee, 2009).
The results of media fragmentation based on political ideology
can have many deleterious effects on our society and political
system. If citizens can shield themselves from opinions that
conflict with their own, they

will receive a one-sided, partisan view of an issue. This

can lead to greater problems among media consumers

interested in politics, as there will be no common frame of
reference about a topic. Citizens will lack information on broad
issue topics, and ignore the opposing point of view on issues
they consider important (Tewksbury, 2006). Fragmentation
according to political ideology creates echo chambers in the
media. Citizens media packages will only include consonant
ideas, excluding any competing opinions. Studies on small group
interactions reveal another negative effect of echo chambers in
the media. The study shows that people who are part of groups
comprised only of like-minded individuals tend to move toward
greater attitude extremity (Mutz, 2006). Sunstein also notes that,
A possible consequence [of media fragmentation] is
considerable difficulty in mutual understanding. When society is
fragmented in this way, diverse groups will tend to polarize
(Sunstein, 2007). This notion answers a central question of this
studyis increased media fragmentation related to increased
political polarization?

Polarization
Before attempting to determine a relationship between media
fragmentation and polarization, it proves useful to examine
research about the level of polarization in American society.
Polarization refers to the trend where people move further from
the center of political debate and toward the extremes of political

ideology. The Economist writes that, the 50-50 nation appears

to be made up of two big separate voting blocks with only a small
number of swing voters in the middle (On his high, 2002).
Diana Mutz says, patterns of aggregate opinion suggest that
partisanship is a driving force in how people perceive, interpret,
and respond to the political world (Mutz, 2006). Clearly, scholars
suggest that we are living in an increasingly polarized political
society. Observations about political debate in Washington today
seem to only further elucidate this assertion.
Still, it is difficult to establish a causal relationship between
higher media fragmentation and an increasingly polarized
citizenry. Instead, a cyclical model seems to emerge where the
media may be reflecting a more polarized citizenry, while the
citizens may also be affected by changes in the media. The latter
seems more probable when one considers the agenda-setting
role of the media (Lee, 2009). One particularly relevant area of
this research is found in a study by Dan Hallin, which discusses
the role of the mass media in bracketing the range of
acceptable opinions for the public (Hallin, 1986). In his view, the
media defines the range of legitimate opinions that the public can
adopt. Applying this theory to the new media environment would
suggest that the proliferation of new media, often with blatant
and extreme partisan biases would expand the range of
acceptable partisan opinions (Hindman, 2009). Ultimately this

could lead to an increasingly polarized society where more

extreme opinions are considered acceptable. Further, countless
media studies have shown that the content of political news has
become much more sensational, more focused on horse race
journalism, and more concentrated on scandal and personal
intrigue (Owen, 2009). What type of agenda is being set by a
media that largely focuses on contentious debate between
political parties, infighting, and personal scandal? Likely, it is an
agenda of partisan fighting and scandal finding, rather than
moderation and issue based compromise.
Several other studies also support the notion that media
selectivity and fragmentation are factors in the higher levels of
polarization. A 2007 study analyzing Pew research data showed
that seven out of ten voters who receive most of their election
news from Fox News supported Bush, the Republican candidate,
while just 21% supported Kerry, the Democratic candidate. In
contrast, voters who got most of their election news from CNN
favored Kerry 67% to Bush 26% (Bernhardt, Krasa, & Polborn,
2008). Jamieson and Cappella also support the assertion that
confining oneself to an echo chamber of news is likely to lead to
increased polarization within ones own group (Jamieson, &
Cappella, 2008). David Jones examines a more specific indicator
of polarizationattitudinal change as a result of media exposure.
This is paramount, as it could be argued that Democrats were

more likely to watch CNN than Republicans, and that their news
intake did not affect their ideology. However, Jones collected
aggregate attitude reports in 1992 and then again in 1996 asking
people about their political ideology, as well as several measures
of media consumption. He found that devoted listeners of Rush
Limbaughs radio talk show were more likely to call themselves
conservative in 1996 than in 1992 (Jones, 2001). These findings
illustrate how media selectivity leads to audience fragmentation
and ultimately to increased polarization of political views.

Television News
Television news analysis is a central component of this study.
Television is the most frequently used source of news for
Americans (Baum, 2003). For this reason, research into the
effects of selectivity and polarization across TV media is
especially important. Before the birth of the cable news network,
people received news from nightly broadcasts on the three
network news channels, CBS, ABC, and NBC. This media
environment offered a relatively homogeneous news product
across the networks, where tuning in to the nightly newscast a
social ritual (Lee, 2009). In 1980, the television news
environment changed drastically with the birth of CNN, followed
by MSNBC and Fox News in 1996 (Morris, 2005). From the
beginning, these cable news networks wanted to differentiate
themselves from the traditional network newscast. MSNBCs

promotional slogans elucidate this goal. They included, Its not

the same old news and Its not your fathers newscast, a play
on the Oldsmobile advertising campaign of the day. Cable news
catered to a relatively small audience, and over time began to
attract unique viewers because of the type of news content they
provided. Data from Jonathan Morris research in The Fox News
Factor shows the migratory trend of TV news consumers. In
1993, 60% of the American public reported watching network
broadcast news on a regular basis. By April 2004, that number
had been almost halved to 34% (Morris, 2005). The data also
shows that network audiences are increasingly older while Fox
News and CNN audiences are increasingly polarized (Morris,
2005). Additionally, another study shows that the audience for
network newscasts has steadily decreased while CNNs
audience has steadily increased over the last few decades (Bae,
2000).
Television news powerfully influences which problems viewers
regard as the nations most serious. (Iyengar, & Kinder, 1987)
This quote, along with the previous research, illustrates that
television is a major outlet for agenda setting and that there is a
great deal of media selectivity based on politically ideology.
Thus, it becomes important to understand how news differs
across these TV outlets as a means of understanding how
fragmented our society may become. Morris explains that

Todays television news market is more heterogeneous than

ever before. Thus, the probability that audiences are getting
exposed to differing political messages increases (West, 2001).
An early content analysis from 1998, showed that there was
already a significant difference in the types of stories and levels
of analysis found, both among cable news shows and between
cable news and network news (Bae, 2000). A more recent study
from 2007 demonstrated that Fox News reputation for having a
conservative bias was well deserved. They found that its news
coverage showed a consistently pro-Republican slant (Iyengar, &
Hahn, 2007). Further, Morris analysis shows that the Fox News
audience is made up of a unique composition of viewers, and
that they are exposed to different coverage than the CNN and
network news watchers. The results also showed that Fox News
watchers were less likely than CNN watchers to follow stories
critical of President Bush and were more likely than nonwatchers to underestimate the number of casualties from the
Iraq war. Overall, he finds that both Fox News and CNN contain
a partisan bias, but perhaps more importantly, he concludes that
both audiences are moving farther from the ideological center
(Morris, 2005). For this reason, it seems likely that the news
product coming out of these outlets will become increasingly
unique, as they continue to cater to their partisan audiences.
Iyengars study expounds on the economic motivations of news
organizations to cater to their viewers political preferences. His

evidence shows that between 2000 and 2004, Fox News

increased the size of its regular audience by almost 50%, as
proof of the viability of the niche-media model today (Iyengar, &
Hahn, 2007).

Methods
This paper employs a statistical analysis to study the trend of
media fragmentation along the lines of political ideology. The
data originated from the Pew Research Center for the People
and the Press. The specific data set under examination is
their Biennial Media Consumption Survey from 2008(Datasets,
2009). The survey asked 3,600 adults a wide range of questions
about their demographics, political opinions, and most
importantly, media consumption habits. I used a bivariate
crosstabulation to generate a contingency table comparing the
frequencies of peoples political preferences with how often they
watched certain partisan news programs.
This analysis looked at several of the survey questions. The first
question asks respondents, In general, would you describe your
political views as They were then provided with responses
including, very conservative, conservative, moderate, liberal, and
very liberal. This question was chosen because one of the goals
of the study was to show that people seek out agreement in their
news and that ideology would likely cast a wider net than party
membership in revealing peoples political preferences. Not

everyone who took the survey answered this question and the n
value for very conservative was only 232 and very liberal was
171. Therefore, in order to have a sufficient size that would allow
my results to be statistically significant, I recoded the response
categories, combining very conservative with conservative and
very liberal with liberal. The next set of questions asked people
to rate how often they watch, listen, or visit the website of
different media outlets. Respondents again had a scale of
choices including, regularly, sometimes, hardly ever, or never. To
emphasize the hypothesis of ideological media fragmentation, I
chose two cable news networks with strong reputations for
having a partisan slantThe Fox News cable channel on the
right, and MSNBC on the left. These two media outlets were also
selected because of the breadth of research conducted on
television news, indicating that TV is the most popular source of
information for Americans and showing that there is abundant
political bias in TV news.
Next, I ran a crosstabulation to show that not only do people
select news that agrees with their ideologies, but also that
consuming this type of news is related to their opinions about
partisan issues. I used the same media consumption question
about Fox News as above, but here I compared the frequency
with which people watch Fox News with their self-reported
approval of George W. Bush, the Republican president. This

survey question read, Do you approve or disapprove of the way

George W. Bush is handling his job as president? My final
statistical analysis was more general in scope, but very important
in showing that peoples self-reported media habits do not
always reflect the actual trends in media consumption. I ran a
frequency analysis of responses to the following question, When
getting news, whats more important to you The response
choices were, getting an overview of the top news of the day,
getting news about topics of particular interest to you, or both.

Results
The statistical analyses described above resulted in many
interesting observations about media fragmentation and
polarization. My hypothesis predicted that media consumers tend
to select media outlets that agreed with their preexisting political
ideology. Table 1 supports this hypothesis by showing that
people who self-identify as conservative watch, read, and visit
the Fox News web site at higher rates than respondents who say
they are moderate or liberal. Conversely, in table 2 we see that
those people who identified themselves as liberals were more
likely to tune in to MSNBC than moderates or conservatives.

Tables 1 and 2 also support the idea discussed in the literature

claiming the stronger a persons partisan affiliations, the more
likely they are to select media outlets that confirm their beliefs
(Iyengar, & Hahn, 2007). The tables show that the results are
more significant in examining the extreme ideological positions.
Of people who regularly watch Fox News, 37.8% are
conservative while only 14.4% are liberal. And conversely,
among regular MSNBC viewers, 20.6% are liberal compared to
12.5% who are conservative.
A closer examination of respondents who identify as moderates
also proves interesting. The moderate respondents diverge from
the general trend of ideological selectivity. Instead, across both
Fox News and MSNBC, the moderates are clustered in the

sometimes and never categories. Considering the existing

research about politically uninterested media consumers, this is
not altogether surprising. First, it is likely that the majority of
politically interested respondents (who are all of voting age)
would have some affiliation, if not with a political party, than at
least with a political ideology. Thus it is probable that a majority
of the people who selected moderate are in fact uninterested in
political news. As discussed extensively above, in todays high
choice media environment, these individuals would avoid political
content by steering clear of 24-hour cable news networks like
Fox News and MSNBC, which both devote a large majority of
their airtime to political issues. While this can account for the
approximately one third of moderate respondents who said they
never watch Fox News or MSNBC, we still must account for
another third who reported watching these outlets sometimes. It
seems apt to assume that these people were both politically
interested and truly moderate. Thus, they would occasionally
access political news from a wide variety of sources with varying
ideological slants. A final observation from the data in tables 1
and 2 is that the trend towards ideological selectivity seems to be
stronger in table 1 where people were asked about Fox News. A
possible explanation for this disparity can be found in the existing
literature on television news. Morris explains that his study
showes, the Fox News audience is slightly more Republican
than the CNN audience is Democrat (Morris, 2005). My study

supports and adds to this assertion by showing that the Fox

News audience is more conservative than the MSNBC audience
is liberal. These findings support yet another study, which
compares Fox News to other new media outlets and shows that
they are in fact more biased than other outlets (Iyengar, & Hahn,
2007).
The general trend in table 3 begins to support the hypothesis
that selective exposure to a partisan media source will affect
peoples political views. The approve column shows an almost
perfectly linear trend, indicating that the more someone watches
Fox News, the more likely they will be to approve of their
Republican president. The disapprove column is not as
significant, so I will refrain from drawing any broad conclusions
from that data. There is an aberration to the trend found in the
never category. This is a logical result, as it can be assumed
that if someone has no exposure to Fox News it cannot affect
their political perceptions. Of people who said they never watch
Fox News, 22.5% approve of the President while 40.1%
disapprove. This data can be explained partly outside the realm
of media consumption. This survey was taken at a time when
President Bush had very low approval ratings overall, which is
likely the cause for this discrepancy.

While table 4 does not directly relate to the stated hypothesis, it

elucidates an important component of this research. I have
argued that media selectivity and fragmentation are
predominantly negative trends. These results may suggest that
most survey respondents agree. 64.1% say that getting an
overview of the news is most important to them, while 26.3% say
they value getting news about topics of particular interest to
them. However, data from tables 1 and 2, as well as countless
other studies about media selectivity, show that this is not the
actual distribution, but instead, far more people seek out news
based on their own interests and ideologies. Perhaps this
incongruity stems from the fact that, while people do filter their
news according to their interests, they understand that this is not
a positive habit and therefore over-report the desire to get an

overview of the news. Another, and perhaps more alarming

possibility, is that many people are filtering and selecting their
media intake without even realizing they are doing it. While twothirds of respondents claim that getting an overview of the news
is most important to them, there is still 26.3% or, 924 out of 3512
people, who admit to active media selectivity. This is paramount
to the basis of my study, as it implies that media selectivity is
already happening with at least a quarter of the population.

Discussion
My hypothesis of media selectivity based on ideological
preference was generally supported by my data. Liberals did
report more exposure to MSNBC than moderates or
conservatives, while the opposite trend was found with respect to
Fox News. These findings contribute to the existing literature in
several ways. First, the results of the statistical analysis support
the general theory of media selectivity. Clearly, different citizens
are utilizing different media outlets, with over a quarter of
respondents admitting that getting news about topics of
particular interest to them is most important. Further, these
findings support the conclusions of many polarization studies by
showing that peoples partisan affiliations are predictors of which
news outlets they will use.
In addition to supporting many existing studies, I set up my
research in a manner that allowed me to produce some novel

results. Some studies have used Fox News as their sample of a

conservative news outlet, yet most compare it with CNN, NPR,
or network news. I chose to compare Fox News with MSNBC, as
in todays television market it is becoming clear that MSNBC has
established itself as the left leaning cable news channel, with
Fox News on the right, and CNN in the center. Evidence for the
Fox News-MSNBC dichotomy is found in a recent interview with
White House adviser, Valerie Jarrett. When asked, do you think
Fox News is biased? Jarrett said, Well of course theyre biased,
of course they are, to which the journalist immediately followed
up with, Do you also think that MSNBC is biased? While CNN
may also have a liberal bias, it is very important to understand
the reputation of the news outlet; as this research is trying to
show that citizens are likely to gravitate towards media they think
will agree with their opinions. I also chose to analyze the
frequency of media exposure compared with political ideological
affiliations rather than political party membership, as many
previous studies have done in order to cast the widest possible
net of political opinion.
There are many avenues of future research on this topic that
have yet to be explored. While there are a few studies that
attempt to establish a causal relationship between selective
media exposure and polarization, more research in this area
would prove very useful. Perhaps a longer study that focuses on

changes in peoples political attitudes as they are consuming

different types of media over time would begin to support this
relationship. Also, the body of work related to high choice media
environments can definitely be expanded with studies focusing
on the effects of Internet media. Just as many studies have
shown greater levels of selectivity with the advent of old new
media, such as talk radio and cable television, research into the
proliferation of new new media like websites, blogs, and social
networking sites will likely reveal similar findings. Considering
that many of these media outlets advertise their break from
objectivity as a positive development, it can be assumed that
they will include more partisan news, possibly expanding the
range of public opinion in the direction of the extremes. Thus,
further investigation into the role of todays new media in agenda
setting and political polarization will prove very important.
Another interesting avenue for continued research on the subject
of media fragmentation would be to look at this issue from a uses
and gratifications perspective. This type of study would employ
qualitative interviews to study peoples motivations for using
specific media outlets for political news.

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