Media Consumption and Racial Residential Preferences

Abstract

ObjectiveTo what extent do mainstream media, social media, and ethnic media consumption, as dominant and counter‐dominant forms of public discourse, connect to where people prefer to live? We unpack whether media consumption influences such preferences in Texas, a racially segregated and increasingly racially diverse state.MethodsUsing the Texas Diversity Survey (n = 1,322), we run a series of logit regression models, stratified by respondent race (Black, Latinx, Multiracial, and White), to measure the relationship between media consumption and racial residential preferences.ResultsWe find that racial residential preferences are shaped not only by expected attributes (e.g., age, education, racial composition of current neighborhood of residence) but also by whether mainstream media are consumed for Latinx respondents. Whites who consume ethnic media are significantly more likely to prefer living in Black and Latinx communities.ConclusionThese findings suggest that public discourse is connected to residential preference formation and a “sense of group position”—but how this happens depends on the media source as well as the group in question.