Media Slant is Contagious

TL;DR

This study investigates how Fox News Channel's increasing viewership influenced local newspapers in the U.S. to adopt more right-wing slants from 1995 to 2008, highlighting media contagion effects on political bias.

Contribution

It provides empirical evidence of media slant contagion, using channel positioning as an instrument to show causality between Fox News viewership and local newspaper bias.

Findings

Higher FNC viewership causes local newspapers to adopt more right-wing slant.

The effect develops gradually over several years.

Local political preferences drive the shift in newspaper slant.

Abstract

This paper examines the diffusion of media slant. We document the influence of Fox News Channel (FNC) on the partisan slant of local newspapers in the U.S. over the years 1995-2008. We measure the political slant of local newspapers by scaling the news article texts to Republicans' and Democrats' speeches in Congress. Using channel positioning as an instrument for viewership, we find that higher FNC viewership causes local newspapers to adopt more right-wing slant. The effect emerges gradually, only several years after FNC's introduction, mirroring the channel's growing influence on voting behavior. A main driver of the shift in newspaper slant appears to be a change in local political preferences.