Mass Opinion Summary

"The Nature and Origins of Mass Opinion by John R. Zaller is one of the most-cited works of contemporary political science, with more than (6,500) citations recorded in the Google Scholar database." (Bartels, L. M.) In his book, Zaller investigates the influence of the "elite media" on the public through survey data. Zaller received his undergraduate degree from the University of California, San Diego in History and then went on to graduate from the University of California, Berkeley in 1984 with a Ph.D. in political science. He was also an editor for a journal called the American Political Science Review. He now works as a professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, studying American politics and public opinion. The book The Nature and Origin of Mass Opinion is mainly based on Zaller's dissertation titled "The Roles and Elites in Shaping Public Opinion." "Almost as soon as the dissertation was submitted, Zaller turned from the macro-focus on the relationship between elite discourse and public opinion to a micro-focus on 'the form and nature of attitudes.' (...) A conference paper aiming 'Toward a Theory of the Survey Response 'and extensive involvement in pilot studies sponsored by the …show more content…
People who are moderate in their views and opinions and have a moderate amount of exposure to political matters are the most inclined to change their opinions. The two other ends of the spectrum tend to not change their opinion simply because they are not exposed to enough information to form an opinion or because they are so over-exposed to information they have formed their own predispositions and will resist arguments against that. However, the biggest conclusion made is that "elite-driven" media that is unified in its opinion will always tend to sway the opinion of the