Econ Papers Daily / 期刊论文
媒体市场结构与确认性新闻
Media Market Structure and Confirmatory News
摘要
This paper studies the effect of media market competition on confirmatory bias, the tendency to confirm common priors to appear competent, while accounting for both single‐ and multi‐homing. It finds that competition helps sustain informative reporting when priors are relatively precise, but has the opposite effect when priors are diffuse. The reason is that when competing outlets are perceived as similarly competent, consumers optimally multi‐home. This creates strategic complementarity in informative reporting and helps sustain it when the priors are relatively precise. However, when perceived competencies diverge, consumers single‐home with the outlet they view as most competent, creating incentives for confirmatory reporting when the priors are diffuse.
中文摘要
本文研究了媒体市场竞争对确认性偏差（即倾向于确认共同先验以显得专业）的影响，同时考虑了单归属与多归属两种情形。研究发现，当先验信息相对精确时，竞争有助于维持信息性报道；但当先验信息模糊时，竞争则产生相反效果。其原因在于：当竞争性媒体被视为具有相似专业能力时，消费者会最优地选择多归属。这种选择在信息性报道中形成策略互补性，并在先验信息相对精确时有助于维持该报道模式。然而，当感知的专业能力存在差异时，消费者会单归属至其认为最专业的媒体，从而在先验信息模糊时产生确认性报道的激励。