Selective exposure theory
Cognitive equilibrium, which is defined as a state of balance between a person's mental representation of the world and his or her environment, is crucial to understanding selective exposure theory.
In this theory, individuals may prioritize certain elements of an event based on personal values, interests, or goals, and may choose to invest their time, energy, and resources in these specific areas.
Selective exposure can often affect the decisions people make as individuals or as groups because they may be unwilling to change their views and beliefs either collectively or on their own, despite conflicting and reliable information.
President John F. Kennedy was given the go ahead by his advisers to authorize the invasion of Cuba by poorly trained expatriates despite overwhelming evidence that it was a foolish and ill-conceived tactical maneuver.
According to research study by Fischer, Schulz-Hardt, et al. (2008), the quantity of decision-relevant information that the participants were exposed to had a significant effect on their levels of selective exposure.
Because of this, the subject becomes more critical of their initial thought process and focuses on both decision-consistent and inconsistent sources, thus decreasing his level of selective exposure.
[11] Therefore, the availability of decision-relevant and irrelevant information surrounding individuals can influence the level of selective exposure experienced during the process of decision-making.
Selective exposure is prevalent within singular individuals and groups of people and can influence either to reject new ideas or information that is not commensurate with the original ideal.
Thus, people are driven toward pieces of information that are coherent with their own expectations or beliefs as a result of this selective exposure theory occurring in action.
Recent research has shown that "Confirmatory Information Search" was responsible for the 2008 bankruptcy of the Lehman Brothers Investment Bank which then triggered the Global Financial Crisis.
In the zeal for profit and economic gain, politicians, investors, and financial advisors ignored the mathematical evidence that foretold the housing market crash in favor of flimsy justifications for upholding the status quo.
Selective exposure occurs when individuals search for information and show systematic preferences towards ideas that are consistent, rather than inconsistent, with their beliefs.
[14] Young adults were less motivated to change and practice health-promoting behaviors because they used the selective exposure to confirm their prior beliefs.
The results from this study showed that people do pay more attention to physically attractive or tempting stimuli; however, this phenomenon can be decreased through increasing the "cognitive load."
In this study, increasing cognitive activity led to a decreased impact of physical appearance and selective exposure on the individual's impression of the idea presented.
His work demonstrated that it is possible to use the scientific method to investigate complex and significant social phenomena without reducing them to the mechanistic connections between stimulus and response that were the basis of behaviorism.
"[16] Cognitive dissonance theory explains that when a person either consciously or unconsciously realizes conflicting attitudes, thoughts, or beliefs, they experience mental discomfort.
[19] When there is a conflict between pre-existing views and information encountered, individuals will experience an unpleasant and self-threatening state of aversive-arousal which will motivate them to reduce it through selective exposure.
To reduce dissonance, people add consonant cognition or change evaluations for one or both conditions in order to make them more consistent mentally.
The theory of cognitive dissonance was developed in the mid-1950s to explain why people of strong convictions are so resistant in changing their beliefs even in the face of undeniable contradictory evidence.
Throughout the book, he argued that the media has a small amount of power to influence people and, most of the time, it just reinforces our preexisting attitudes and beliefs.
He argued that the media effects of relaying or spreading new public messages or ideas were minimal because there is a wide variety of ways in which individuals filter such content.
Due to this tendency, Klapper argued that media content must be able to ignite some type of cognitive activity in an individual in order to communicate its message.
Klapper noted from the review of research in the social science that given the abundance of content within the mass media, audiences were selective to the types of programming that they consumed.
If someone is already exposed by close friends, which creates predisposition toward something, it will lead to an increase in exposure to mass communication and eventually reinforce the existing opinion.
[11] Recent studies have shown relevant empirical evidence for the pervasive influence of selective exposure on the greater population at large due to mass media.
Using data from the 2004 National Annenberg Election Survey, analysts found that over time partisan selective exposure leads to polarization.
[37][5] This process is plausible because people can easily create or have access to blogs, websites, chats, and online forums where those with similar views and political ideologies can congregate.
According to Cass Sunstein's book, Republic.com, the presence of selective exposure on the web creates an environment that breeds political polarization and extremism.
While there are mixed findings of peoples' willingness to participate in the political processes when they encounter disagreement, the authors argue that the issue of selectivity needs to be further examined in order to understand whether there is a truly deliberative discourse in online media environment.
