Selective Exposure to Communication

First published in 1985. Research into what is usually referred to as mass communication has concentrated on the societal impact of the media. The ways in which these media influence people and affect their behavior have been at issue. For the most part, undesirable effects were pondered and documented. Only a few desirable effects received similar attention and scrutiny. The research preoccupation with impact has been so pronounced that, comparatively speaking, next to no attention has been paid to questions such as why people enjoy whatever they elect to watch or hear, and more fundamentally, why they elect to watch or hear, in the first place, whatever it is that they elect to watch or hear. Without a symposium on research into selective exposure to informative and entertaining messages nor a publication that brought together the recent research in this area, this volume was put together in an effort to end this dilemma and to put selective-exposure research on the map as a significant research venture.