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Abstract

Both academic researchers and political pundits have warned about the cumulative effects of partisan media over time. This concern hinges on the idea that repeated exposure to extreme media may have a much greater influence on political attitudes than a single viewing. On the other hand, the persuasive effect of partisan media might be temporary and decay quickly after a single exposure. To explore this possibility, we implement a novel set of multiwave experiments that allow us to examine concerns about media effects over time, and present estimates from three studies which suggest that the persuasive effect of exposure to just a short article or video clip can persist for up to a week. In contrast to this persistence, our results suggest that an experiment adequately powered to detect the accumulative effect from multiple doses of partisan media — let alone one powered to detect accumulative effects among subgroups of the population — would require an unrealistic number of respondents, suggesting that such effects are difficult to test in an experimental setting with limited resources.

Citation

Baum, Matthew A., Adam J. Berinsky, Justin de Benedictis-Kessner, Joohye Jeong, Zachary Markovich, and Teppei Yamamoto. "Dynamic Persuasion: Decay and Accumulation of Partisan Media Persuasion." March 2025.