The Influence of Political Information Processing Skills among New Young Voters in Malaysia ABSTRACT: The eligible voters age limit from 21 years to 18 years and triggered the issue of political participation readiness among new young voters in Malaysia. This study claims that media literacy skills from political information process dimension influence the political participation readiness. This study aims to evaluate the influence of media literacy skills from political information process dimension towards political participation readiness. There are seven political information process skills that are verified such as analysis, evaluation, grouping, induction, deduction, synthesis and abstract. By using survey and simple random sampling towards 547 respondents aged 18 to 26 years, this study, strategize data collection to represent the population of new young voters in Malaysia. The map of Malaysia is divided into North, South, East, West and Borneo Zones covering urban and rural areas. This study reported that the skills of induction, deduction and synthesis have positive influence towards political participation readiness among new young voters in Malaysia. However, the skills of analysis, evaluation, grouping and abstracting do not have any significant influence. This study suggests a strategic collaboration between the Ministry of Youth and Sports with the Malaysian Election Commission, the Ministry of Communications and the Ministry of Digital in the National Service Training Program (PLKN). This initiative is expected increase the level of political participation readiness among new young voters in Malaysia. Keywords: Media literacy, new young voters, political information processing skills, political participation, voting.
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