I'm working on a follow-up study to my earlier one on who thinks Barack Obama is Muslim. I won't bore you with the details, but as part of the analysis I'm looking at a host of ways people get the news, down to specific sources.
So far, out of 18 ways to get news and information, only one stands out as resulting in a greater likelihood people think Obama is Muslim.
Yup, you guessed it. Watching Fox News.
Watching Fox, in this early look at the numbers, makes you nearly twice as likely to say he's a Muslim.
And here's the wow factor. Even if I statistically control for stuff like a respondent's racism score, education, race, living in the South, and political interest (just a few I tossed in quickly) -- watching Fox News still makes you more likely to perceive Obama is Muslim.
It's the only one that does this.
A bunch of them have no relationship at all with perceptions of Obama being Muslim (the major broadcast networks, listening to Rush Limbaugh (surprise!), getting news via social media like Twitter or Facebook. A few reduce the likelihood of thinking Obama is Muslim (watching Jon Stewart or Stephen Colbert, CNN, MSNBC, or reading The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times).
This is a first blush of data that'll require deeper analysis, but I was so surprised -- okay not really surprised -- by only one network showing up, figured I had to share.
2 comments:
Fox News, via Sally Kohn's coverage of Paul Ryan's speech, actually impressed me for the first time today. I was astounded that they published something calling him out on his "inaccuracies."
I believe I saw someone mention this on Twitter as well. Very interesting.
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