Television Markets and U. S. Senate Elections

Abstract

Using data drawn from the 1988 Senate Election Study and additional data describing the nature of television markets, we show that the structure of television markets within states influences to what extent citizens are likely to have media contact with senatorial candidates and how they evaluate the candidates. Citizens are less likely to see candidates on television if they reside in states with fragmented television market structures (i.e., many different markets and markets that serve more than one state). Citizens of fragmented states are also more likely to vote for incumbents. The marginal effectiveness of campaign spending on candidate visibility and the likelihood of voting for a candidate decrease as the cost of advertising in a state increases. Political scientists have grown increasingly sophisticated in their understanding of the role of mass media in electoral politics. This sophistication is most evident in the realm of House elections, where a variety of methods and perspectives has been used to analyze how the media influence the strategies of candidates, the public's knowledge about candidates, and the behavior of voters. This article extends that understanding to Senate elections. We note an interesting tendency in the literature on legislative campaigns: although the House has been the focus of the systematic study of media influence in elections (see Goldenberg and Traugott 1987), the mass media probably play a more direct role in Senate campaigns. Therefore, shifting the focus from the House to the Senate not only changes the object of research but also moves us closer to the core of media influences in congressional elections. The mass media play a more pronounced role in Senate elections because of the Senate's political geography and the high prestige attached to the office of U.S. senator. The size of most Senate constituencies virtually requires the use ofretail techniques to reach potential voters, leading Senate candidates toward the tube rather than toward the handshake on the street. At the same time, House districts frequently cut across media markets (either television markets or newspaper readership