The Effect of Ethnicity and Number of Co-Viewers on Affective and Cognitive Identification With Media Characters

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

This research examines the distinctiveness of two components of identification with media characters: cognitive and affective. It also explores how these components are differentially affected by the viewing environment. In an experiment, Jewish and Arab Israelis watched a clip depicting the Israeli–Palestinian conflict with either one or two Jewish or Arab co-viewers. As hypothesized, these components of identification loaded on different factors and showed different relationships when referring to in-group and out-group characters. Moreover, the Jewish participants showed more affective identification with the Jewish protagonist when watching with two Arabs, which, in turn, affected their attitudes about the in-group.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)663-682
Number of pages20
JournalJournalism and Mass Communication Quarterly
Volume97
Issue number3
DOIs
StatePublished - 1 Sep 2020

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
Tal-Or Nurit 1 1 University of Haifa, Israel Nurit Tal-Or, Department of Communication, University of Haifa, 31905 Haifa, Israel. Email: ntalor@com.haifa.ac.il 11 2019 1077699019886580 © 2019 AEJMC 2019 Association for Education in Journalism & Mass Communication This research examines the distinctiveness of two components of identification with media characters: cognitive and affective. It also explores how these components are differentially affected by the viewing environment. In an experiment, Jewish and Arab Israelis watched a clip depicting the Israeli–Palestinian conflict with either one or two Jewish or Arab co-viewers. As hypothesized, these components of identification loaded on different factors and showed different relationships when referring to in-group and out-group characters. Moreover, the Jewish participants showed more affective identification with the Jewish protagonist when watching with two Arabs, which, in turn, affected their attitudes about the in-group. co-viewing identification media characters out-group attitudes Israel Science Foundation https://doi.org/10.13039/501100003977 985/10 edited-state corrected-proof Declaration of Conflicting Interests The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. Funding The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: The current work was funded by the Israel Science Foundation (Grant No. 985/10). Supplemental Material Supplemental material for this article is available online.

Publisher Copyright:
© 2019 AEJMC.

Keywords

  • attitudes
  • co-viewing
  • identification
  • media characters
  • out-group

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Communication

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