How Partisan Media Exposure Shaped Party Evaluations in the 2023 Elections in Serbia
How Partisan Media Exposure Shaped Party Evaluations in the 2023 Elections in Serbia

Summary/Abstract: This study sought to investigate how voters in Serbia perceived political parties in the run-up to the 2023 elections and how selective exposure to party-affiliated media influenced their perceptions. To achieve this, the study analyzed the latent structure of party evaluations and investigated how partisan media exposure predicts the extracted dimensions, after controlling for sociodemographic and attitudinal predictors of party evaluations. On a convenience online sample of 1033 respondents (57% female), it was found that political parties are mentally organized into three factors: parties of civic opposition, parties of national opposition, and ruling parties. Regression analyses have shown that evaluations of the three mentioned party blocs are best predicted by different media consumption patterns. Positive evaluations of civic opposition parties are predicted by the female gender, low religiosity and authoritarianism, values of social and economic liberalism, high interest in politics, and following opposition television channels and websites. Support for national opposition parties can be predicted by male gender, living in smaller towns or rural areas, high religiosity, values of social conservatism, and to some extent watching public broadcasting services. Regime-affiliated parties are more likely to be supported by older citizens from smaller towns, who tend to be religious, authoritarian, less interested in politics, and primarily viewers of pro-regime television channels and readers of pro-regime websites.

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