Survey: Fox News Viewers Least Informed, Most Negative About Occupy Wall Street

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Survey: Fox News Viewers Least Informed, Most Negative About Occupy...

Released: 2/15/2012 12:00 PM EST
Source: University of Delaware

Video interviews with the researchers are available online: http://bit.ly/wYUiN6 http://bit.ly/yScmWu and http://bit.ly/yU2WQm

Newswise — A major new national University of Delaware survey reveals that Fox News Channel viewers know less about the Occupy Wall Street protests than consumers of other media sources, and hold particularly negative views about the protests.

The January 18-25, 2012, survey measured Americans’ perceptions of the Occupy Wall Street movement. The results show Fox News viewers stand out for their lack of knowledge about Occupy Wall Street’s central message.

Among Fox News viewers, only 56 percent correctly identified the protesters’ main message as “too few people control the majority of the nation’s wealth and power.” The rest either incorrectly said that protesters’ main message was “there is too much regulation on business and industry” or did not answer the question. Consumers of other media sources included in the survey were more likely to know the right answer.

Fox News viewers, despite their relative lack of knowledge, maintained negative opinions about the protests. Fox viewers were more likely than consumers of other outlets to say they disagreed with the protesters.

Dannagal Young, assistant professor of communication, said “Anytime you give people an opportunity to enter an opinion echo chamber (like Fox News or MSNBC), their pre-existing opinions are only going to get stronger

http://www.newswise.com/articles/view/585832/