Subjectivity in media source perception: Fox News versus NPR

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to explore the link between political affinity and source credibility perception through the cases of Fox News and NPR. Based on the third-person perception framework, this study combines the Q methodology and focus group interviews to investigate the interaction of audience and source in shaping the credibility of a media source. Results confirmed the third-person perception in that audiences tend to perceive a politically aligned news channel as being trustworthy, but fails to attain the social impact it deserves. In contrast, audiences perceive a hostile news channel as having social impact although not being trustworthy.