News Coverage of Different Political Scandals: Effects on Political Support

• In Event: ICA Plenary Interactive Paper/Poster Session I
  In Interactive Paper Session: Political Communication Interactive Poster Session

Abstract

This study examines to what extent news coverage of different political scandal (i.e., a sexual, financial and power scandal) affect citizens’ political support, and to what extent this effect is contingent on levels of politically sophistication. This is important, as news coverage about political scandals damages politicians’ image, but more decisively, it can also affect democracy as a whole. Using an online experiment, a four factorial between-subjects design, we found that different types of scandals have a direct impact on politicians’ character credibility. Additionally, we found tentative support for the theoretical argument that sex scandals have the lowest impact, financial scandals have a medium impact, and power scandal have the largest impact on character credibility. Interestingly, results show that less politically sophisticated citizens become more cynical when they encounter a sex or power scandal. This emphasizes that the role of political sophistication is important when examining the impact of scandals.

Authors

• Tea Marja Sofia Miettinen, University of Amsterdam

• Sanne Kruikemeier, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam School of Communication Research ASCoR

• Linda Bos, University of Amsterdam