Media Consumption and Public Engagement

Governments in many countries fear voting turnout and political engagement is in terminal decline, threatening the long-term legitimacy of the democratic process. Meanwhile definitions of politics and the public world are changing, while media formats are proliferating and media audiences fragmenting in the age of digital media. How are these important trends related? And what do our everyday habits of consuming media contribute to our possibilities of being effective citizens?

NICK COULDRY is Professor of Media and Communications at Goldsmiths College, University of London, UK. He is the author or editor of several books including Media Rituals: A Critical Approach and Listening Beyond the Echoes: Media, Ethics and Agency in an Uncertain World.

SONIA LIVINGSTONE is Professor of Social Psychology, London School of Economics, UK. She is the author or editor of many books including Young People and New Media, Making Sense of Television: the Psychology of Audience Interpretation (in its 2nd edition) and Handbook of New Media.

TIM MARKHAM is Lecturer in Journalism, Department of Continuing Education, Birkbeck College, University of London, UK.

List of Tables	p. x
List of Figures	p. xi
Preface	p. xiii
Theoretical Foundations
Democracy and the Presumption of Attention	p. 3
Introduction	p. 3
The idea of 'public connection'	p. 5
Public connection: the conceptual and empirical background	p. 8
Accounts of the crisis of democracy	p. 12
The current UK and international context	p. 16
Conclusion	p. 20
Media Consumption and Public Connection	p. 23
Why media consumption?	p. 23
The plurality of media	p. 24
'The media' - legitimate object of blame?	p. 26
Mediating a shared frame of attention	p. 28
From the collective to the public	p. 30
The traditional centrality of the news	p. 32
Engaging with media in late modernity	p. 34
New and emerging sites of mediated public connection	p. 37
Conclusion	p. 40
Tracking Public Connection: Methodological Issues	p. 42
Overall design	p. 42
Research precedents	p. 43
Diary methodology	p. 45
Issues of interpretation	p. 50
The Public Connection Survey	p. 55
Comparing the diary and survey data	p. 56
Conclusion	p. 57
The Public Connection Project
Introduction	p. 61
Diary phase	p. 61
Survey phase	p. 63
Mediated Public Connection: Broad Dynamics	p. 65
Introduction	p. 65
Modelling individual diarists' public connection	p. 66
The dynamics of mediated public connection	p. 76
Underlying orientations	p. 81
Public/private	p. 83
An alternative definition of the 'public' world?	p. 84
Conclusion	p. 87
The Variability of Media Use	p. 88
The nature of our evidence	p. 88
Patterns of media use	p. 97
Quality of media use	p. 98
Media use and wider routine	p. 103
Critical media use and media literacy	p. 105
Conclusion	p. 109
Values, Talk and Action	p. 111
Values	p. 111
The duty to keep up with the news	p. 113
Talk	p. 114
Action	p. 121
Conclusion	p. 127
Democracy Seen from Afar	p. 130
Henry	p. 130
Josh	p. 132
Andrea	p. 133
Kylie	p. 135
Beccy	p. 136
Samantha	p. 138
Bill	p. 140
Sheila	p. 142
Shared concerns	p. 144
Conclusion	p. 145
Engagement and Mediation: Findings from the Public Connection Survey	p. 147
Introduction	p. 147
Declining public participation	p. 148
Linking media consumption to public participation	p. 153
Mediating participation	p. 157
Relating political participation and public connection	p. 160
Contextualising participation	p. 166
Conclusion	p. 170
Conclusion
Conclusion: The Future of Public Connection	p. 179
Review of our findings	p. 180
The Public Connection Survey	p. 185
Summary of empirical findings	p. 188
Where do we go from here?	p. 188
Conclusion	p. 194
Appendices
The Public Connection Diarists	p. 196
Regional Profiles	p. 199
Interview and Focus Group Schedules	p. 203
Technical Note on Timeline Construction	p. 212
Survey questions	p. 215
Demographic Breakdown of Survey Population	p. 219
References	p. 221
Index	p. 239
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Media Consumption and Public Engagement Beyond the Presumption of Attention

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