David Tenner
2018-04-03 15:52:24 UTC
A common take on the first JFK-Nixon debate of 1960 goes somewhat as
follows: "Nixon wasn't looking good--five o' clock shadow. But on the
substance of the debate, he won, as is shown by the fact that while a
majority of TV viewers thought JFK won, a majority of people who heard the
debate on radio thought Nixon did."
The problem with this line of argument is that there is very little
evidence for it, as these three webpages point out:
***
(1) Ron Simon, Curator, Television and Radio at the Paley Center for
Media:
"The central myth we should expose is that the majority of the audience
who heard the first debate on radio thought Nixon won; those who watched
on television were so seduced by the visual that they gave the nod to
Kennedy. This claim, repeated in every media book, is based on a poll
conducted by Sindlinger and Company, which has now been questioned on many
fronts. Most of their small sample that listened on the radio were from
Republican areas and probably predisposed to think favorably of Nixon. It
wasn't that the radio listeners were less biased in evaluating the
debate."
https://www.paleycenter.org/p-the-nixon-kennedy-debates-a-look-at-the-myth/
***
(2) W. Joseph Campbell, professor in the School of Communication at
American University in Washington, D.C., and author of *Getting It Wrong:
Ten of the Greatest Misreported Stories in American Journalism*
(University of California Press 2010, revised edition 2016):
"What's remarkable about this hoary media myth is that it persists despite
its thorough dismantling 30 years ago by David Vancil and Sue D. Pendell.
"They noted in a journal article that evidence for viewer-listener
disagreement is thin, flawed, and anecdotal. Moreover, no public opinion
surveys conducted in the immediate aftermath of the debate were aimed
specifically at gauging reactions radio audiences.
"Often cited in support of the claim that radio listeners felt Nixon won
the encounter is a post-debate survey by Sindlinger & Company, which
reported that radio listeners, by a margin of 2-to-1, thought Nixon had
prevailed.
"Vancil and Pendell pointed out that Sindlinger’s survey included more
than 2,100 respondents--of whom only 282 said they had listened on radio.
Of that number, 178 (or fewer than four people per state) 'expressed an
opinion on the debate winner,' they wrote. The sub-sample was too small
and unstable to support sweeping judgments about reactions of television
and radio audiences nationwide, Vancil and Pendell noted.
"Not only that, but the sub-sample failed to identify from where the radio
listeners were drawn. 'A location bias in the radio sample,' Vancil and
Pendell wrote, 'could have caused dramatic effects on the selection of a
debate winner. A rural bias, quite possible because of the relatively
limited access of rural areas to television in 1960, would have favored
Nixon.'
"The Sindlinger data were flawed, and essentially useless in assessing how
radio listeners reacted to the debate."
https://mediamythalert.wordpress.com/tag/1960-debate/
***
(3) David Greenberg, professor of History and of Journalism & Media
Studies at Rutgers University:
"But Vancil and Pendell found several reasons for being skeptical of
Sindlinger's findings. First, only 282 radio listeners were surveyed--
fewer than is usually considered sound for a national random sample.
Second, there was no effort to poll a representative group, so we have no
idea whether the survey included, for example, a disproportionate number
of Republicans. Third, there was no effort to explore whether radio
listeners as a group might have been more likely from the start to prefer
Nixon--perhaps, say, because they lived in more rural areas that
television had not yet penetrated. (Relatively few Catholics--a key
Kennedy constituency--lived in the countryside.)
"Vancil and Pendell even present some statistical evidence to suggest that
the Sindlinger sample probably included a disproportionate number of Nixon
supporters. In any event, this single, flawed survey hardly constitutes
strong enough grounds for the idea that Nixon won on radio to have gained
the currency that it has."
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/history_lesson/2010/09/rewinding_the_kennedynixon_debates.html
***
Unfortunately, the Vancil-Pendell study to which all three web pages refer
does not seem to be available for free online:
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10510978709368226?journalCode=rcst19
But the apparent conclusion does seem plausible enough: Nixon defeated
JFK handily in most rural counties (except in the South), and rural
counties were probably the ones least likely to have television in 1960.
So there may have been a built-in-bias among those who listened on radio.
follows: "Nixon wasn't looking good--five o' clock shadow. But on the
substance of the debate, he won, as is shown by the fact that while a
majority of TV viewers thought JFK won, a majority of people who heard the
debate on radio thought Nixon did."
The problem with this line of argument is that there is very little
evidence for it, as these three webpages point out:
***
(1) Ron Simon, Curator, Television and Radio at the Paley Center for
Media:
"The central myth we should expose is that the majority of the audience
who heard the first debate on radio thought Nixon won; those who watched
on television were so seduced by the visual that they gave the nod to
Kennedy. This claim, repeated in every media book, is based on a poll
conducted by Sindlinger and Company, which has now been questioned on many
fronts. Most of their small sample that listened on the radio were from
Republican areas and probably predisposed to think favorably of Nixon. It
wasn't that the radio listeners were less biased in evaluating the
debate."
https://www.paleycenter.org/p-the-nixon-kennedy-debates-a-look-at-the-myth/
***
(2) W. Joseph Campbell, professor in the School of Communication at
American University in Washington, D.C., and author of *Getting It Wrong:
Ten of the Greatest Misreported Stories in American Journalism*
(University of California Press 2010, revised edition 2016):
"What's remarkable about this hoary media myth is that it persists despite
its thorough dismantling 30 years ago by David Vancil and Sue D. Pendell.
"They noted in a journal article that evidence for viewer-listener
disagreement is thin, flawed, and anecdotal. Moreover, no public opinion
surveys conducted in the immediate aftermath of the debate were aimed
specifically at gauging reactions radio audiences.
"Often cited in support of the claim that radio listeners felt Nixon won
the encounter is a post-debate survey by Sindlinger & Company, which
reported that radio listeners, by a margin of 2-to-1, thought Nixon had
prevailed.
"Vancil and Pendell pointed out that Sindlinger’s survey included more
than 2,100 respondents--of whom only 282 said they had listened on radio.
Of that number, 178 (or fewer than four people per state) 'expressed an
opinion on the debate winner,' they wrote. The sub-sample was too small
and unstable to support sweeping judgments about reactions of television
and radio audiences nationwide, Vancil and Pendell noted.
"Not only that, but the sub-sample failed to identify from where the radio
listeners were drawn. 'A location bias in the radio sample,' Vancil and
Pendell wrote, 'could have caused dramatic effects on the selection of a
debate winner. A rural bias, quite possible because of the relatively
limited access of rural areas to television in 1960, would have favored
Nixon.'
"The Sindlinger data were flawed, and essentially useless in assessing how
radio listeners reacted to the debate."
https://mediamythalert.wordpress.com/tag/1960-debate/
***
(3) David Greenberg, professor of History and of Journalism & Media
Studies at Rutgers University:
"But Vancil and Pendell found several reasons for being skeptical of
Sindlinger's findings. First, only 282 radio listeners were surveyed--
fewer than is usually considered sound for a national random sample.
Second, there was no effort to poll a representative group, so we have no
idea whether the survey included, for example, a disproportionate number
of Republicans. Third, there was no effort to explore whether radio
listeners as a group might have been more likely from the start to prefer
Nixon--perhaps, say, because they lived in more rural areas that
television had not yet penetrated. (Relatively few Catholics--a key
Kennedy constituency--lived in the countryside.)
"Vancil and Pendell even present some statistical evidence to suggest that
the Sindlinger sample probably included a disproportionate number of Nixon
supporters. In any event, this single, flawed survey hardly constitutes
strong enough grounds for the idea that Nixon won on radio to have gained
the currency that it has."
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/history_lesson/2010/09/rewinding_the_kennedynixon_debates.html
***
Unfortunately, the Vancil-Pendell study to which all three web pages refer
does not seem to be available for free online:
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10510978709368226?journalCode=rcst19
But the apparent conclusion does seem plausible enough: Nixon defeated
JFK handily in most rural counties (except in the South), and rural
counties were probably the ones least likely to have television in 1960.
So there may have been a built-in-bias among those who listened on radio.
--
David Tenner
***@ameritech.net
David Tenner
***@ameritech.net