The Cognitive Impact of Television News ― Production Attributes and Information Reception

The Cognitive Impact of Television News examines how much information people get from televised news. While people around the world consistently nominate TV as their most important news source, research has shown that its actual impact does not usually measure up to viewers' own beliefs about it. Televised news can impart important information to people that they value and can use in many ways, but more often much of the content of news bulletins is lost to viewers within moments. Broadcast news professionals pride themselves of producing objective, timely, balanced and comprehensive coverage of events of the day, yet viewers can take away misleading and incomplete impressions of those events. Although viewers do not always pay close attention to bulletins when watching TV, a significant part is played in the loss of news information to news audiences by the way the news is written, packaged and presented. News professionals use production techniques that can distort information or cause confusion in viewers. This book examines research evidence to show how such information losses can occur.

Barrie Gunter is Professor of Mass Communication in the Department of Media and Communication, University of Leicester, UK, where he was also head of Department from 2005 to 2012. He is a psychologist by training and worked in the broadcasting sector for 15 years before moving into the academic world. He has published nearly 60 books and over 300 papers, chapters and technical reports on media, marketing and psychology topics.