(Person) Percentage - Sabanci University Research Database

The Asian Media & Mass Communication Conference 2010 Osaka, Japan
This study primarily focuses on the following research questions:
1. Does the television news use derive newspaper use more than the reverse among
heavy television viewers?
2. Does the heavy television news viewing lead to greater interpersonal discourse?
3. Does the interpersonal discourse positively relate to political (war on terror)
news?
4. Does the interpersonal discourse relate to feelings of external political efficacy
(internally displaced persons)?
Media and Mediation in Crises
The backdrop of mediation in crises was set by the well known media theorist, McLuhan
(1994) while narrating “the medium is the message”, as conceptualizing that the central
mediating factor in any society is the medium of communication itself. He states “the
personal and social consequences of any medium------- that is, of any extension of
ourselves---- result from the new scale that is introduced into our affairs by each
extension of us or by any new technology”.
McLuhan made the medium itself and not its functions, or its use, the centre of media
logical analysis. The medium is not for McLuhan a system of transportation nor a system
of representation of a reality that precedes it, but an each time different material mode of
perceiving that reality. The medium in other words plays a part, a significant part, in the
process of signification, so that you can establish correlation between media forms and
ways of communicating, but also ways of perceiving and defining reality and ways of
thinking (Carpignano, 1997).
Historically, societies living under repressive regimes have always come up with
alternative forms of communication as tools of subversion. While underground
newspapers and ‘pirate radio’ have been some of the most common forms, the advent of
new communication technologies in recent years has brought new forms of alternative
media with greater possibilities for transnational and even wider citizen participation and
empowerment (Moyo, 2007).
There are numerous studies in the area of mediation, specifically while using computermediated
communication (cmc) as a major intervening variable. Brian (2004) has
developed a model using cmc competence through review of social trends in the use of
new media technologies. Special attention is paid to the role new media plays in the
formation and development of personal relationships.
In another study, Peter et al. (2004) examined television mediation and found it to be
most strongly predicted by the age of the child and the game behavior of the parents,
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