Hostile imagination at work: American opinion makers' perceptions of the media role in stereotypes of Russians and Eastern Europeans

This study looked at the stereotypical beliefs about and attitudes towards Russians and Eastern Europeans held by American opinion makers. American opinion makers are generally avid consumers of media and possess highly structured knowledge of international and domestic affairs, which in turn, provides them with the ability to direct, influence and ultimately, determine foreign policy.; This study examined whether the mass media, as potential producers, distributors and disseminators of stereotypical portrayals of Russians and Eastern Europeans in news and other media content and also as potential tools for legitimizing social power, contribute to the construction of the social reality of opinion makers in conjunction with other social predictors, such as background variables (age, gender, and education); information-transmitting variables (contact and international political knowledge about Russia and Eastern Europe), and personality-mediating variables (ethnocentrism and personal ideology).; Using the theoretical framework of social construction of reality, this study proposed a model of relationships among factors determining the social construction of stereotypes. The mass media were the major focus as factors which can directly or indirectly influence the perceptions of opinion makers, and thus, have an impact on foreign policy. Apart from more commonly used exposure measures such as attention (in this case, to international news) and interest (in this case, to news from Russia and Eastern Europe), this study also looked at nature of media sources trusted by respondents (conservative/liberal ideological orientation and American/foreign origin), media content, i.e., respondents' perception of valence (positive or negative) and of bias (favorable or unfavorable) of media portrayals of Russians and Eastern Europeans, and finally, media effect, i.e., respondents' perception of stereotypes as tools of social oppression (levels of agreement). Stereotypes were operationalized as beliefs about and attitude towards Russians and Eastern Europeans.; The study conducted a cross-sectional survey of members of the American Political Science Association and discovered that beliefs about and attitudes towards Russians and Eastern Europeans are generally positive and considerably favorable. Beliefs were explained by personality-mediating variables, namely, ethnocentrism, and by mass media variables, namely, ideological orientation of trusted media source, and perceived valence and bias of media portrayals. Attitudes were predicted by ethnocentrism and by the ideological orientation and reported origin of the trusted media source.; A post-hoc analysis demonstrated that mass media related variables contributed to explaining both beliefs and attitudes over and above the contribution made by background, information, an personality variables, lending further support to the importance of the mass media in negotiating reality for audiences, including opinion makers, who may engage these negotiated stereotypes in the process of foreign policy decisions.