A study from UCLA shows that the US media has biases that come out in their news coverage. And, most media leans to the left. I feel like I am stating the obvious, but there seems to be some confusion in this area at times, so hopefully the UCLA study will help clarify the facts.
“I suspected that many media outlets would tilt to the left because surveys have shown that reporters tend to vote more Democrat than Republican,” said Tim Groseclose, a UCLA political scientist and the study’s lead author. “But I was surprised at just how pronounced the distinctions are.”
There were some surprising findings. While the editorial page of The Wall Street Journal is conservative, the newspaper’s news pages are liberal. The Drudge Report may have a right-wing reputation, but it leans left (see an explination below). Coverage by public television and radio is conservative compared to the rest of the mainstream media. Meanwhile, almost all major media outlets tilt to the left.
Of the 20 major media outlets studied, 18 scored left of center, with CBS’ “Evening News,” The New York Times and the Los Angeles Times ranking second, third and fourth most liberal behind the news pages of The Wall Street Journal.
The most centrist outlet proved to be the “NewsHour With Jim Lehrer.” CNN’s “NewsNight With Aaron Brown” and ABC’s “Good Morning America” were a close second and third.
Since Groseclose and Milyo were more concerned with bias in news reporting than opinion pieces, which are designed to stake a political position, they omitted editorials and Op-Eds from their tallies. This is one reason their study finds The Wall Street Journal more liberal than conventional wisdom asserts.
Another finding that contradicted conventional wisdom was that the Drudge Report was slightly left of center. But, most information on the Drudge Report are links to major media outlet, so that skewed the Druge Report findings. By linking to major media, Drudge moves to the left.
“Very little was based on the stories that Matt Drudge himself wrote. The fact that the Drudge Report appears left of center is merely a reflection of the overall bias of the media.”
The study does not explain WHY the mainstream media leans to the left- but maybe that can be a topic for a future research paper.
The results will appear in the latest issue of the Quarterly Journal of Economics, which will become available in mid-December.
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