The Public’s Views of Professor Punditry

Abstract

This chapter offers an empirical test of the Professor Pundit approach to political coverage. We used two survey embedded experiments on national population samples to test reaction to academics featured in television news coverage of political events. Our expectation is that audiences will have a generally positive impression of these academics when they cite findings from scholarly research (and without making partisan references). In relating these findings, academics put their expertise forward in the service of audience understanding of politics—thereby fulfilling our view of how academics can rehabilitate punditry’s use and reputation. Across analysis from both experiments, the news stories featuring academics referencing research findings received substantially more positive response from audiences than academics offering what might be best termed “conventional punditry.”

With Jeffrey Layne Blevins and Kevin Swift