Media-Induced Or Search-Driven?

Abstract

In an effort to advance knowledge of the online agenda-setting process during a trigger event, this longitudinal macro-level study explores the over-time relationship between US news media attention and aggregate search interest of the online public in BP plc throughout the Gulf of Mexico oil spill in 2010. The results provide strong evidence of an interactive two-way street in the transfer of salience between the media and search agendas. In addition to slower-moving, basic agenda-setting effects of news coverage volumes on aggregate search query volumes, this study documents an instance of faster-moving “reverse agenda setting” with the news media responding to search trends during the prolonged oil spill disaster. The theoretical, methodological, and practical implications of these findings are discussed.