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Media Bias in Interviewers’ Nonverbal Behavior: Potential Remedies, Attitude Similarity and Meta-analysis

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Abstract

Previous research demonstrated that viewers’ judgments of an interviewee are influenced by the nonverbal behavior of the interviewer. In studies of this media bias effect, judges view a short political interview with a friendly or a hostile interviewer, and then rate their impressions of the interviewee, whose behavior remains identical in all conditions. The present research utilizes the same design and materials to explore potential cognitive remedies, to investigate the effect of attitude similarity on media bias, and to meta-analyze seven replications of the media bias effect. In Study 1, a cognitive remedy in the form of an instruction to ignore the interviewer neutralized and even reversed the media bias effect. In Study 2, insertion of a brief segment depicting a “beaming” and relaxed interviewee also reversed the media bias effect. Study 3 demonstrated that negative ratings of the interviewee due to interviewer’s hostility were intensified when respondents considered the interviewee as “one of them” politically, and disappeared when he was perceived as “one of us”. Study 4 demonstrated the consistency of the media bias effect by meta-analyzing seven replications in different countries. Implications for nonverbal research and for media research concerning the consistency of the media bias effect and its amenability to remedy are discussed.

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Notes

  1. Readers can view both interviews serving as the stimulus materials in the following link: http://www.youtube.com/user/NvStudy. It is recommended that readers who can understand Hebrew would first view the interview with the audio volume turned off.

  2. Readers can view the beaming interview in the same link mentioned before: http://www.youtube.com/user/NvStudy.

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Acknowledgments

This research was supported by a grant from the Israel Science Foundation. Elisha Babad is Anna Lazarus Professor of Educational Social Psychology at the School of Education, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel. Eyal Peer is a doctoral student in educational psychology at the School of Education, Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Thanks are extended to Yehonatan Benayoun and Lisandro Monaco for their assistance, to Moshe Inbar for his participation, to Peter Caryl in Edinburgh and Hank Kaplowitz in New Jersey for enabling the administration, to Robert Rosenthal, to John Darley, and to Dinah Avni-Babad.

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  1. School of Education, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 91905, Mt. Scopus, Jerusalem, Israel

    Elisha Babad & Eyal Peer

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  1. Elisha Babad
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  2. Eyal Peer
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Correspondence to Elisha Babad.

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Babad, E., Peer, E. Media Bias in Interviewers’ Nonverbal Behavior: Potential Remedies, Attitude Similarity and Meta-analysis. J Nonverbal Behav 34, 57–78 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10919-009-0078-x

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