Decline in news coverage of local congessional races hurting voters

Rural Blog - A decline in local coverage of congressional races  in recent years has led citizens to be less informed about federal issues and less likely to become engaged in those issues, says a study by researchers at George Washington University and American University in Washington, D.C., GWU political-science professor Danny Hayes writes for The Washington Post.

"Our analysis, based on a large-scale study of local coverage and citizen behavior in every congressional district across the country, demonstrates that the fading of two-newspaper towns is not the only problem," Hayes reports. "When the content of local news deteriorates—as has happened nationwide in an era of newsroom austerity—so do citizen knowledge and participation."

"When we merge our newspaper data with survey data from the 2010 Cooperative Congressional Election Study, we find that voters in districts with less news coverage know less about the candidates running for the House," Hayes writes. "For instance, as the volume of news coverage declines, citizens are less able to identify candidates as liberals or conservatives. They are also less likely to say that they will cast a ballot in the House contest. We find that this is true not only for the least politically engaged voters but also those who are typically more attentive to politics. Where the news environment is impoverished, engagement is diminished for all citizens."