Research Paper on:
Media and Democratization

Unformatted Sample Text from the Research Paper:
have directly collided with the theory that mass media are supposed to be the watchdogs of democracy. II. AGENDA SETTING Words carry  with them a great deal of power; they are capable of destroying nations and rebuilding faith. They are eloquent and strong, intimidating and potent. Language serves many purposes  but of its many overwhelming influences, none are as significant as its ability to impart information. The theory of agenda setting asserts that mass media do not tell people  outright what they should think; instead, the basis of spotlighting certain issues is to tell people what to think about. Clearly, one might not readily comprehend the seemingly insignificant  difference between the two thoughts, inasmuch as some believe that mass media have long acted as social dictator when it comes to providing biased information. The theory of agenda  setting - which "focuses on the cognitive, indirect effects of the mass media" (Matthews et al, 2002) - is said to represent mass medias position as societys "gatekeeper," meaning that  television, magazines and newspapers collectively determine "which items of information hold significance for society" (Tenorio, 2002), thereby deciding which social and political issues are worthy of attention and establishing an  unnatural prominence of topics. "...Increase salience of a topic or issue in the mass media influences (causes) a salience of that topic or issue among the public" (McCombs et  al, 1991, p. 12). Many mass communications scholars chose to focus upon agenda setting research as an alternative to looking for individual-level directional  media effects - which had often been found to be minimal and disappointing - because the vast majority of findings attributed to these studies clearly illustrated that "the direct effects