“Something’s Going on Here, but We Don’t Know What it is: Measuring Citizens’ Exposure to Politically Relevant Information in the New Media Environment”

To say that today’s information environment is radically different from that of even a decade ago may be stating the obvious, but in many ways the full range of the changes that have occurred are not fully appreciated and are even less well understood. The average U.S. household now receives over 100 television stations. According to a recent survey released by the Pew Internet and American Life Project, three-quarters of American adults have cell phones and use the internet, 4 in 10 have broadband connections and send and receive text messages on their cell phones, and 1 in 5 have created media content themselves, which they have then shared with others through the internet. According to this survey, almost one-third of Americans could be classified as heavy and frequent users of the new information technologies. At the same time, structural and content changes in both old and new media have all but obliterated traditional distinctions between news or public affairs genres, on the one hand, and entertainment and cultural genres, on the other. As mind-boggling as theses changes have been, they continue at a breakneck pace-for example, YouTube did not even exist in 2004.