Setting The Collective Memory Agenda Memory Studies-2014-Kligler-Vilenchik-484-99

Memory
Studies
http://mss.sagepub.com/
Setting the collective memory agenda: Examining mainstream media influence on

individuals' perceptions of the past
Neta Kligler-Vilenchik, Yariv Tsfati and Oren Meyers
Memory Studies 2014 7: 484 originally published online 7 March 2014
DOI: 10.1177/1750698014523443
The online version of this article can be found at:
http://mss.sagepub.com/content/7/4/484
Published by:
http://www.sagepublications.com
Additional services and information for Memory Studies can be found at:
Email Alerts: http://mss.sagepub.com/cgi/alerts
Subscriptions: http://mss.sagepub.com/subscriptions
Reprints: http://www.sagepub.com/journalsReprints.nav
Permissions: http://www.sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.nav
Citations: http://mss.sagepub.com/content/7/4/484.refs.html
>> Version of Record - Sep 3, 2014

OnlineFirst Version of Record - Mar 7, 2014
What is This?
Downloaded from mss.sagepub.com at UNIV FEDERAL DE MINAS GERAIS on November 5, 2014
523443
research-article2014
MSS0010.1177/1750698014523443Memory StudiesKligler-Vilenchik et al.
Article
Setting the collective memory

agenda: Examining mainstream
media influence on individuals
perceptions of the past
Memory Studies
2014, Vol. 7(4) 484499
The Author(s) 2014
Reprints and permissions:
sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav
DOI: 10.1177/1750698014523443
mss.sagepub.com
Neta Kligler-Vilenchik
University of Southern California, USA
Yariv Tsfati
University of Haifa, Israel
Oren Meyers
University of Haifa, Israel
Abstract
Memory studies scholars tend to stress the significance of the media in shaping collective memories. This
study offers a quantitativeempirical examination of this phenomenon. Applying a memory-setting research
design, inspired by agenda-setting theory, the study examines correlations between the media memoryagenda and public memory-agenda, to illuminate the influence of the media on the shaping of collective
perceptions of the past. Findings point at a significant correlation between media and public memoryagendas, one that increases during periods of heightened coverage of past events. On the individual level,
the role of media exposure to commemorative content is significant, surpassing that of direct participation in
public commemoration. At the same time, some of the findings point to the resiliency of the public memoryagenda. Therefore, the studys findings offer a novel understanding of the role of mass media in shaping
collective memory, as well as the limits to its influence.
Keywords
agenda-setting, collective memory, commemoration, Israel, media memory
As the field of memory studies continues to thrive, memory scholars increasingly point at the significance of the media as offering powerful representations of the past, and as a major source for
knowledge and attitudes regarding the past (e.g. Edy, 2006; Kansteiner, 2002). The media are seen
Corresponding author:
Neta Kligler-Vilenchik, Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism, University of Southern California, 3502
Watt Way, Los Angeles, CA 90089, USA.
Email: kliglerv@usc.edu
Kligler-Vilenchik et al.
485
as having an enormous influence on the shaping of collective recollections (Huyssen, 2000: 29),
due to their wide reach and pervasive messages, their adept use of narrative forms (Kitch, 2005), and
their mnemonic collaboration with other social agents (Meyers etal., 2009). Yet decades of media
effects studies have shown that the influence of the media on its audiences is often less direct and
evident than expected. Most of the works that underscore the medias role do not link public representations of the past with individual perceptionsthe individual, in fact, is often absent in collective memory studies (Kansteiner, 2010). This study aims to further probe medias role as a mnemonic
agent, by quantitatively examining its influence on individuals perception of the collective past.
Within the field of media memory studiesthat is, the systematic exploration of collective
pasts, narrated by the media, through the media and about the media (Neiger etal., 2011: 1)
there is a prevalent tendency to focus on mass mediated representations of memory, such as news
coverage or documentaries, while overlooking the memories of individuals. Media texts are often
used as a proxy for the collective understanding of the past. Yet, even Halbwachs (1952/1992: 182)
claimed that while memory relies on social frameworks, it is individuals who recollect. Thus, the
relations between public representations of memory and the memories of individuals remain a key
debate in the field (Kansteiner, 2002, 2010; Olick, 1999; Ricoeur, 2004).
The following study contributes to this debate by examining one possible area of media influence: how the past events most salient in the media may influence individuals perceptions of the
most important events in history. To do so, this study borrows methods from media studies, and
applies agenda-setting theory and methodology to the study of collective memory, using a
memory-setting approach (Kligler-Vilenchik, 2011). The memory-setting research design incorporates two methodologiesa content analysis and a surveyin order to examine the correlation
between the past events most salient in mainstream media and those perceived by individuals as
most important. In order to enable increased causal interpretation of correlative data, this research
design was applied at two time points: at a time of routine, during which the media covered the past
marginally; and during the celebration of Israels 60th anniversary in May 2008, a time at which
discussion of historical events was brought to the foreground of media discourse. Comparing the
two points in time enabled us to examine how intensified media mentions of past events may affect
individuals perceptions in the short term.
This design bridges between media scholarship and memory studies, applying methods and
insights gained in media effects research to enrich the understanding of the processes of formation
and change of collective memory. Empirically analyzing the associations between media and public memories can help us further establish the medias role in shaping public recollection.
Collective memory and media memory

When Halbwachs (1952/1992) first introduced the notion of a social framework within which
remembering occurs, he claimed that while individuals are those who remember, they obtain their
memories in a social setting, and recollect in socio-cultural contexts. Conceptually, we can think of
collective memory as consisting of two complementary aspects: on the one hand, the mnemonic
signifiers found in our surroundings, such as memorial sites, museums, and media coverage. On
the other hand, the term signifies the knowledge and perceptions of individuals in a society regarding its past (Bar-On, 2001; Olick, 1999). The two are seen as interrelated, but how?
For media memory scholars, the media are seen as a powerful tool in shaping perceptions of
the past. Edy (1999) claims that the medias crucial role can be attributed to their ability to simultaneously reach mass audiences, and provide interpretations of the past that are hard to avoid.
Moreover, the representations of the past conveyed by the mass media appear in a narrative form
(Kitch, 2005), stressing an emotional aspect, rendering them more resonant than structured
486
Memory Studies 7(4)
learning. This is true for both fictionalized representations and news. While intuitively, we would
expect news to focus solely on the present, the past is nearly omnipresent in journalism (Meyers,
2007; Zelizer, 2008).
Media representations of the past have often been critically analyzed as cultural artifacts, usually focusing on one specific event, yet they are rarely examined quantitatively. This may be partly
due to the difficulty of operationalizing this complex phenomenon. In our quantitative content
analysis scheme, we choose to focus on one aspect of media memory: the extent of mentions of
past events. This approach enables to compare references to the past both synchronically, across
different forms of media, and diachronically, in the same media outlet over time. Using the same
categories and coding instructions to examine both the media and individual responses enables us
to link the two types of data.
We conducted a content analysis to ask how prevalent the past is in the media, and how this
prevalence changes over time. To answer these questions, media content was examined at two
points in time. The first is a time of routine (T1), in which no commemoration was expected according to the national calendar. The second point in time (T2), set during Israels 60th anniversary
celebrations, was hypothesized to be one of enhanced media coverage of past events, as the media
partake in national commemoration efforts. This includes both ceremonial televised media events
(Dayan and Katz, 1992) such as the official Independence Day ceremony, broadcast live on all
broadcast channels, and coverage of celebratory entertainment content.
While Israels 60th anniversary was expected to garner particular media attention toward past
events, this tendency is repeated, to a lesser extent, around every Independence Day. The annual
reiteration of this period is accompanied by media commemoration of what are deemed as the
major national past events. Hence, the 60th anniversary was expected to serve as a particularly
salient example of the commemorative role the media takes upon itself every year. The more pertinent question was, how may this increased mediated commemoration shape individuals perceptions of the past?
Between individual and collective memories

The controversy over the relations between individual and collective memories (see, for example,
Kansteiner, 2010; Olick, 1999; Ricoeur, 2004) may very well have begun with its founder. While
mostly known as a student of Durkheim, Halbwachs was also taught by Bergson, and was influenced by his individualistic notions of memory (Coser, 1992). While Halbwachs generally accepted
a Durkheiman view of society as the significant source of influence on memory, Bergsonian individualistic influences can still be detected in his work (Ricoeur, 2004; see also Misztal, 2003).
Halbwachs saw individuals as recalling memories, though the groups to which the individual
belongs provide the contents for her memory, notably through other people with whom the memory is shared.
Despite the extensive use of the term collective memory, there is a lack of empirical evidence regarding the extent to which large segments of the public share a common set of past
events that are deemed most central. Methodologically and conceptually, analysis of public representations cannot serve to infer that a shared memory among groups of individuals exists
(Bourdon and Kligler-Vilenchik, 2011; Schwartz and Schuman, 2000). Studies that do connect
personal and collective memories rely mostly on in-depth interviews (e.g. Welzer, 2010) or focus
groups (Volkmer, 2006). Yet, if we want to generalize and argue for a collective memory, shared
by wide audiences, we need to implement methodologies that will enable us to reach these populations. A series of studies conducted by Howard Schuman and his colleagues represents one
attempt at this approach.
487
In the first study, Schuman and Scott (1989) examined the effect of generational identity on the
shaping of collective memory. The authors employed a survey, asking Americansas an operationalization of the concept of collective memorywhich national and global events they perceived as most important. A generational effect was found, as people perceived events from their
youth as most important. At the same time, there was a sense of a widely shared memory: 64% of
respondents mentioned one of the top three events. This study spurred a series of subsequent investigations, which examined the memories of individuals across different nations, generations, and
events (for the Israeli context, see Schuman etal., 2003).
As part of the debate over the individual and collective aspects of memory, this method was met
with some critique. For instance, Olick (1999) claims that collected memorythe aggregation
of disparate individuals memoriesmisses a great deal of what is going on (p. 342). He contends that there are collective phenomena that cannot be predicted through the responses of individuals, as well as aspects which social institutions stress, even if individuals try to avoid them. His
final point, however, is that individual and collective memory cannot be treated as separate.
The approach embraced by this study attempts a middle ground between Schumans approach
and Olicks cultural critique. Like Olick, we see public culture as a key arena for retelling the collective past and shaping the public memory. Like Schuman, we believe that collective memory can
also be examined through the aggregation of individuals memories of past events. As Schwartz
and Schuman (2000) claim, analyzing individuals memories and cultural representations of the
past do not contradict but complement each other. We propose bridging these traditions not only
because we see both as offering valuable ways to understand how societies perceive their past, but
also because we see collective representations of memory and individual memories as potentially
mutually shaping one another. To examine how this operates, this study borrows from agendasetting theory, a media effects theory designed to analyze the medias influence on its audience.
Applying agenda-setting toward the study of collective memory

Originating from the work of McCombs and Shaw (1972), agenda-setting theory posited that the
press may not be successful much of the time in telling people what to think, but it is stunningly
successful in telling its readers what to think about (Cohen, 1963: 13). In its basic version, agendasetting theory seeks correlations between the public agenda and the media agenda. The media
agenda examines the salience of issues mentioned in the media, usually obtained using a quantitative content analysis. The public agenda refers to the issues perceived as important by the public
at a certain point in time, usually measured through surveys. The agenda-setting effect of the media
on the public agenda seems to hold under a variety of conditions, for a diversity of issues, and
when explored with diverse research methods (Dearing and Rogers, 1996: 92).
To apply agenda-setting theory to the study of collective memory, we examine the correlation
between the media memory-agenda: the past events salient in the media, and the public memoryagenda: past events deemed as most important by the public. This process, which we call
memory-setting, is based on several conceptual and epistemological assumptions which agendasetting and memory studies share (Kligler-Vilenchik, 2011). Clearly, the richness of collective
memory cannot be fully captured by mentions of past events alone. Yet referencing events cues
wider narratives about the collective past, or, as Zelizer (1995) vividly argues, events give memory a platter on which to serve historical accounting (p. 231).
In fact, both agenda-setting and memory-setting can be thought of as functioning on two levels. In agenda-setting research, the distinction is made between first-level agenda-setting, which
asks which issues are the most salient on the media agenda, and second-level agenda-setting,
which analyzes the salience of attributes through which these issues are discussed (see,
488
Memory Studies 7(4)
for example, Kiousis etal., 1999). Similarly, the media can be conceptualized as shaping public
memory in two interrelated ways: first, by highlighting or marginalizing what is remembered, and,
second, by shaping the nature of these memories. Much memory studies work attends to the second
aspect, discussing the ways in which the media shape differing narratives of past events (e.g.
Zelizer, 1992). These rich narrative aspects cannot be captured in our content analysis. However,
the first stage of setting the memory-agendadetermining which events are salient in public
memoryis in itself a key source of power and influence. This is particularly true when some past
events have acquired insistent political meanings over time (Kligler-Vilenchik, 2011; Misztal,
2003).
Relying on the general concept of agenda-setting theory, if we assume that the media influence
individuals memories, this would manifest in a correlation between media and public memoryagendas. Therefore,
H1: The media memory-agenda (a rank-order of the past events mentioned in the media) and
public memory-agenda (a rank-order of the past events mentioned as important by individuals)
will be significantly correlated.
Due to the expectation that the extent of media memory will increase in T2, as the media partake
in commemorating Israels 60th anniversary, it is assumed that the medias influence on individuals memories will increase as well, resulting in stronger associations between the two:
H2: The correlation between the media memory-agenda and the public memory-agenda will
increase in T2, in comparison to T1.
By randomly assigning the survey respondents to one of the points in time, T1 or T2, a quasiexperimental setting is enabled. The increased media coverage of past events expected between T1
and T2 can be seen as a natural manipulation, enabling to gauge the influence of increased media
memory on collective memory perceptions among individuals. The aim of this research design is
to increase our ability to infer causal relationships when using correlational data.
Despite this methodological addition, such a correlational analysis does not rule out the possibility that factors other than media are responsible for the effect. A second stage of analysis in this
study includes individual-level regressions conducted on the survey data. These enable us to control for the effect of variables such as direct participation in commemorative rituals, while pointing
to the specific role of the media in predicting the naming of certain past events as most
important:
RQ1: Which individual-level variables best predict naming the past event most salient in the
media?
Method
Content analysis
The goal of the content analysis was to quantify mentions of past events in the media, as an operationalization of media memory. In each of the studys time points, content analysis was held for 7
days, prior to the administration of the survey. The corpus included television (Israeli channels 1
and 2, Israels leading public and commercial broadcast channels) and daily newspapers (Yediot
Aharonot, the most popular daily newspaper at the time, and Haaretz, considered Israels leading
489
elite newspaper).1 Television content consisted of prime-time broadcasts (8:0011:00 p.m.), including commercials. Newspaper content included the main news-section, and all supplemental sections, including all advertisements.
Coders identified mentions of past events according to a coding scheme list. This list consisted
of past events mentioned as important in the survey, as well as additional past events that were
salient in the media during preliminary coding. The final list included 19 events,2 listed in Table 1.
The unit of analysis was defined as a single mention of a past event (n = 4001 mentions), which
could be explicit: the name of the event (including multiple possible names for some events) or an
implicit mention of that event. For example, the statement Israel celebrates its 60th anniversary
was considered as one (implicit) mention of the establishment of the State of Israel. An event could
be mentioned multiple times in the same newspaper item or television program, and each mention
was counted separately. The entire coding corpus consisted of 84 hours of television broadcasts
(1267 mentions), and 22 newspaper issues (2734 mentions of past events). The content was coded
by two coders. Inter-coder reliability was tested on 20% of the corpus. Nominal Krippendorff
alphas were at over 0.89 for unitization (number of mentions per article or per 5 minutes of broadcast), and over 0.97 for the event mentioned. The media memory-agenda was defined as the rankorder of the aggregate frequency of past events mentioned in the media, according to the content
analysis.
Survey
The aim of the survey was to establish the public memory-agenda: the aggregate frequency of past
events mentioned by the public. The survey further elicited amount and content of media exposure
over the past week, as well as demographic variables. The phone survey was administered to a
representative sample of the adult Jewish Hebrew-speaking population3 by the University of
Haifas Computerized Survey Center, beginning on the first Sunday following the week of the
content analysis. The first wave, 36 March 2008, consisted of 251 respondents; and the second
wave, 1115 May 2008, consisted of 266 respondents.4 Of the 517 respondents, 46.8% were male
and 53.2% female, with a mean age of 47 years. Israeli-born respondents made 66.7% of the sample, while 33.3% were born elsewhere. There were no significant differences on demographic variables between respondents at T1 and T2.
Measures
Most important past event. This variable served to establish the public memory-agenda. Building
on the work of Schuman etal. (e.g. Schuman and Scott, 1989), the first question of the survey
asked respondents: Of all the events and changes that occurred in Israel and the world over the
past 100 years, please mention the two events that seem to you as most important. Respondents
could mention any event (in fact, some mentioned purely personal events), and their responses
were coded into the same list of events used for the media coding. Inter-coder reliability for 20%
of the responses elicited almost full agreement (Krippendorffs alpha = .99).
Naming the event most salient in the media served as the dependent variable, only for the second
stage of the analysis (the logistic regressions). Based on the first survey question (the most important past event), this measure was coded as a binary, where (1) meant naming as the most important
past event the same event that was overwhelmingly most salient in the media: the establishment of
the State of Israel, and (0) meant choosing any other event.5
Amount of television exposure. This variable was determined by averaging two questions: In the
past week, how much television did you watch on an average weekday, and In the past weekend,
490
Memory Studies 7(4)
Table 1. Frequency and percentages of past events mentioned in the survey and content analysis by time point.
Event
Survey
T1 n (%)
Establishment of the
State of Israel
World War II
9/11
Holocaust
Six-Day War
Collapse of USSR
Second Lebanon War
Rabins Assassination
Inventions
Moon Landing
Peace with Egypt
Gaza Disengagement
World War I
Tsunami
Gulf War
Yom Kippur War
First Lebanon War
Operation Entebbe
Lebanon Withdrawal
Total
T2 n (%)
123 (27.7%) 125 (28%)
Newspaper coverage
TV coverage
T1 n (%)
T1 n (%)
61 (14.7%)
T2 n (%)
594 (68.7%)
54 (24%)
T2 n (%)
813 (78%)
76 (17.1%) 74 (16.6%) 78 (18.8%)

83 (3.6%)
13 (5.8%)
22 (2.1%)
50 (11.3%) 40 (9%)
4 (3%)
3 (0.1%)
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
40 (9%)
49 (11%) 145 (34.9%) 239 (10.3%) 41 (18.2%)
45 (4.3%)
13 (2.9%)
29 (6.5%)
12 (2.9%)
53 (2.3%)
14 (6.2%)
32 (3.1%)
20 (4.5%)
18 (4%)
3 (0.7%)
5 (0.2%)
4 (1.8%)
0 (0%)
17 (3.9%)
20 (4.5%)
45 (10.8%) 109 (4.7%)
32 (14.2%)
58 (5.6%)
15 (3.4%)
21 (4.7%)
10 (2.4%)
49 (2.1%)
13 (5.8%)
3 (0.3%)
15 (3.4%)
17 (3.8%)
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
15 (3.4%)
12 (2.7%)
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
12 (2.7%)
11 (2.5%)
4 (1%)
7 (0.3%)
0 (0%)
9 (0.9%)
12 (2.7%)
9 (2%)
5 (1.2%)
56 (2.4%)
36 (16%)
5 (0.5%)
8 (1.8%)
5 (1.1%)
2 (0.5%)
8 (0.3%)
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
6 (1.4%)
7 (1.6%)
3 (0.7%)
7 (0.3%)
0 (0%)
5 (0.5%)
9 (2%)
3 (0.7%)
11 (2.7%)
9 (0.4%)
3 (1.3%)
3 (0.3%)
4 (0.9%)
3 (0.7%)
11 (2.7%)
63 (2.7%)
5 (2.2%)
23 (2.2%)
3 (0.7%)
3 (0.7%)
7 (1.7%)
13 (0.6%)
1 (0.4%)
8 (0.8%)
4 (0.9%)
0 (0%)
11 (2.7%)
18 (0.8%)
8 (3.6%)
16 (1.5%)
2 (0.5%)
1 (0.2%)
3 (0.7%)
3 (0.1%)
1 (0.4%)
0 (0%)
444 (100%) 447 (100%) 415 (100%) 2319 (100%) 225 (100%) 1,042 (100%)
USSR: Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.

Survey responses are for mentioning an event as one of the two most important events. The total of 100% for survey
mentions is for responses that correspond to categories in the content analysis. Responses with no parallels in the
content analysis (e.g. events from personal life) were omitted.
how much television did you watch on average per day? The questions refer to the past week, as
this week was examined in the content analysis.6 Answer categories included, less than an hour, or
none (1); between 1 and 2 hours (2); over 2 hours but less than 4 hours (3); and 4 hours or more (4)
(M = 2.04, standard deviation (SD) = 0.91).
Amount of newspaper reading. Respondents were asked, In the past week, how many times did you
read newspapers? If asked, respondents were told to include reading online news as well. Answer
categories included, not at all (1); about once a week (2); twothree times a week (3); and four
times a week or more (4) (M = 3.05, SD = 1.16).
Amount of television exposure related to Israels 60th anniversary. In this question, asked only in T2,
respondents were asked to estimate: Out of the television contents you watched this week, how
much was related to Israels 60th anniversary? For example, Independence Day celebrations, programs and documentaries about events in Israeli history, and celebratory entertainment shows? Possible answer categories ranged from none of the contents were related to Israels 60th anniversary
(1) up to all of the contents were related to Israels 60th anniversary (5) (M = 2.96, SD = 1.19).
Amount of newspaper reading related to Israels 60th anniversary. This question, appearing only in T2,
asked respondents, Out of the contents you read this week on the newspaper, how much was
491
related to Israels 60th anniversary? For example, content about Independence Day celebrations,
non-fiction accounts of events in Israeli history. The same categories were used as for the previous
question (M = 2.76, SD = 1.00).
Participation in ceremonies commemorating Israels Fallen Soldiers. Respondents were asked, This
year, did you participate in ceremonies commemorating Israels Fallen Soldiers, conducted at a
public venue or a school? Answer categories were, yes (48.1%); I did not participate but watched
a ceremony on television (29.3%); and no (22.2%). In the regression, since the variable of interest
was direct participation, the variable was recoded with participation coded as 1, and no participation or watching on TV coded as 0.
Participation in public celebrations of Israels Independence Day. Respondents were asked, Did you
participate in public celebrations of Independence Day this year (e.g. attend a public ceremony,
celebrations at a public venue, etc.)? Of the respondents, 44% participated in public celebrations,
28.6% watched celebrations on television, and 27.4% did not participate. The variable was recoded
(participation = 1; no participation or watching on TV = 0).
Demographic variables. Variables included were gender (male = 0, female = 1), age (in years), country of birth (Israel = 0, elsewhere = 1), and years of schooling (M = 14.5, SD = 3.38). Religiosity,
income, and political views were omitted as they were not found significant predictors of the
dependent variable, and their inclusion did not affect the pattern of results.
Results
Preliminary results: the media and public memory-agendas at T1 and T2
Table 1 presents frequencies and relative frequencies for the events mentioned by survey participants as one of their two most important past events at a routine point in time (T1) and at the week
of Israels 60th anniversary (T2), as well as the frequency of mentions these events received in the
newspaper and television coverage at these times, according to the content analysis. The table lists
all events mentioned in the media; events mentioned by survey respondents that did not have a
parallel in news coverage (e.g. personal events) were not included in the table. Relative frequencies
were calculated for the events in the table only.
In the survey, the two events most frequently mentioned at both time points were the establishment of the State of Israel and World War II. One of the most interesting findings of the
study emerges from these initial descriptive results: the consistency between the public agendas
at the two time points is striking. Despite the fact that these are two different samples, and
despite the differential media coverage and commemorative efforts during these points in time,
there is a strong correlation between the public agenda at T1 and T2 (Pearsons r = .983, p <
.001).7 This points to the resiliency of collective memory, and the extent to which, at least
among a Jewish-Israeli population, there is high agreement on the set of most important historic
events. On the surface level, not detecting a higher percentage of survey respondents mentioning the establishment of the State of Israel given the greater media coverage of it at T2 points at
a lack of a media effect. As our further analyses will show, the medias influence turns out to be
more nuanced.
Turning to mainstream media coverage, we find a more diverse picture. In the newspapers, the
events most frequently mentioned at T1 were the Holocaust, World War II, and the establishment
of the State of Israel. At T2, the establishment of the State of Israel was the most salient
492
Memory Studies 7(4)
event, followed by the Holocaust and the Second Lebanon War. In television coverage, the most
frequently mentioned event at T1 was the establishment of the State of Israel, followed by the
Holocaust and the Disengagement from Gaza. At T2, the establishment of the State of Israel was
the most salient event, followed by the Second Lebanon War and the Holocaust.
Due to the commemorative role that the media undertakes (Neiger etal., 2011), we expected
that the extent of media memorythe frequency of mentions of past events in the mediawould
increase from T1, a time of routine coverage, to T2, the week of Israels 60th anniversary. This
should come as no surprise, yet this increase in the mention of past events needs to be noted, as it
serves as the natural manipulation for our quasi-experiment.
In prime-time television broadcasts, past events were mentioned 225 times at T1 and 1042 times
at T2, a statistically significant increase of 363% (2(1) = 527, p < .001). In newspaper coverage,
mentions of past events increased from 415 at T1 to 2319 at T2, a statistically significant increase
of 458% (2(1) = 1326, p < .001). Thus, as expected, during the week of Israels 60th anniversary,
past events were much more salient on the medias agenda, creating a natural condition of extensive media memory.
The memory-setting function of the media

The first hypothesis of the study posited that, as would be expected according to agenda-setting
theory, a significant correlation will be found between the media memory-agenda: the rank-order
of the aggregate frequency of past events mentioned in the media, and the public memory-agenda:
the rank-order of the aggregate frequency of past events mentioned most often by the public. To
test this, a correlation was conducted on the full list of 19 events mentioned (see Table 1). This
hypothesis was supported. A strong correlation was found between the public memory-agenda and
the television memory-agenda (Pearsons r = .816, p < .001), as well as the public memory-agenda
and the newspaper memory-agenda (Pearsons r = .854, p < .001). These correlations present a first
step in pointing to the medias possible memory-setting effect.8
As previously discussed, however, analyzing correlations between the public and media
memory-agendas at one point in time is not sufficient in order to infer a causal media influence. For
this reason, the correlations were analyzed separately for T1 and T2. The increased volume of media
memory at T2, due to the celebration of Israels 60th anniversary, thus served as a natural manipulation. In this quasi-experimental design, an increased correlation between the media and public
memory-agendas at the second time point could be interpreted as the result of increased presence
of media memory.
As Table 2 shows, at T1, the public memory-agenda and the media memory-agenda were moderately correlated, both in terms of the correlation between the public and television memoryagendas (Pearsons r = .61, p = .005), and the correlation between the public and newspaper
memory-agendas (Pearsons r = .56, p = .014). At T2, correlations between the public and media
memory-agendas increased in magnitude to a strong correlation. This is true both for the correlation between the public and television agendas (Pearsons r = .81, p < .001), and the correlation
between the public and newspaper agendas (Pearsons r = .84, p < .001). Based on a confidence
Table 2. Correlations between the media memory-agenda and the public memory-agenda at T1 and T2.
Television
Newspaper
T1
T2
Confidence intervals for the differences
r = .61, p = .005
r = .56, p = .014
r = .81, p < .001

r = .84, p < .001
0.24 p1 p2 0.53
0.37 p1 p2 0.63
493
Table 3. Changes in categories of event mentions in the survey from T1 to T2.
Type of event
Major Israeli
Minor Israeli
International
T1
220
34
190
255
19
173
T2
Total
475
53
363
Changes in categories of event mentions in newspaper coverage from T1 to T2
T1
277
48
90
T2
2051
162
106
Total
2328
210
196
Changes in categories of event mentions in television coverage from T1 to T2
T1
154
54
17
960
55
27
T2
Total
1114
109
44
Total
444
447
891
415
2319
2734
225
1042
1267
interval around the difference between Z scores for both correlations, there is a significant increase
in the magnitude of all three correlations between T1 and T2 (for = .05). The correlation between
the media and public memory-agendas was significantly stronger at T2, at a time of increased
media coverage, confirming our second hypothesis.
The increased correlation between the media and public memory-agendas at T2 may come as
a surprise, given the similarity between the public agendas at T1 and T2. But which event mentions make for this tighter alignment at T2? As Table 3 shows, through the shift from T1 to T2, the
public converged around a number of major Israeli events: ones that were already at the forefront of public attention (the 6 most salient Israeli events, mentioned by over 10 survey respondents at both time points).9 At the same time, from T1 to T2 there was a decrease in the publics
mentions of the 6 minor Israeli events (e.g. Operation Entebbe) and of International events.
This shiftan increase in the number of mentions of major Israeli events, and decrease in minor
Israeli events and international eventsis significant for the survey mentions (2(2) = 7.61, p =
.022) as well as in the media (for newspaper coverage, 2(2) = 172.92, p < .001; for television,
2(2) = 100.33, p < .001).
Individual-level logistic regressions

In the second stage of our analysis, the research question asking which factors lead to agreement
with the media memory-agenda was answered using a stepwise binary logistic regression, in which
the dependent variable was naming the event most salient in the mediathe establishment of the
State of Israelas one of the two most important past events.10 This analysis is presented only for
T2, in order to evaluate variables related to the commemoration of Israels 60th anniversary, which
were present only at the second point in time.11 The results of the regression are shown in Table 4.
The first set of variables in the models is composed of demographic variables. Age and education were found to be significant factors affecting the propensity to agree with the media memoryagenda. Controlling for all other variables in the model, each year increase in respondents
education increased the odds of naming the establishment of the State of Israel as the most important event by 16% (for p < .01). Ceteris paribus, each year increase in respondents age increased
the odds of agreeing with the media memory-agenda by 2.8% (p = .01). Demographics alone were
found to account for 10.7% of the variance in the dependent variable.
494
Memory Studies 7(4)
Table 4. Factors affecting the propensity to name the past event most salient on the media memoryagenda (logistic regressions) (N = 174).
Model 1
Model 2
Model 3
(SE)
exp() (SE)
exp() (SE)
exp()
Age
Gender (female = 1)
Country of birth (else = 1)
Education
Amount of TV exposure
Amount of newspaper
exposure
TV content related to
60th anniversary
Newspaper content
related to 60th
anniversary
Participation in celebration
of 60th anniversary
Participation in soldiers
memorial ceremony
Intercept
Likelihood ratio (2)
df
Pseudo R2
.027* (.011)
.478 (.320)
.063 (.350)
.147** (.057)
1.027
0.620
0.939
1.158
.025* (.012)
.371 (.333)
.035 (.366)
.163** (.062)
.025 (.199)
.128 (.246)
1.026
0.690
1.036
1.177
1.025
1.136
.028* (.012)
.371 (.333)
.027 (.371)
.160** (.062)
.030 (.200)
.156 (.251)
1.028
0.690
1.028
1.173
1.031
1.169
.425** (.166)
1.529
.422** (.166)
1.525
.309 (.194)
0.734
.311 (.194)
.732
.236 (.351)
1.266
.095 (.343)
1.100
3.314** (1.040) 0.036

14.541
4
10.7
4.515** (1.644) 0.011

22.024
8
15.9
4.845** (1.709) 0.008

22.641
10
16.3
SE: standard error; df: degrees of freedom.

Estimates are standardized and unstandardized logic coefficients with standard errors in parentheses.
*p < .05; **p < .01.
The second set of variables were media exposure variables, added in model 2. The variables
relating to the amount of media exposure were found to be nonsignificant, showing that extent of
any exposure to the media did not significantly affect the propensity to agree with the media
memory-agenda. The type of television content, however, was found to be a significant contributor.
On a five-point scale, respondents estimated how much of the content they watched on television
the previous week was related to the celebration of Israels 60th anniversary. Ceteris paribus, each
point increase on this scale increased the odds of mentioning the establishment of the State of Israel
as the most important event (for p < .01) by 52.5%.12 Newspaper content, however, was not found
significant. Media variables were found to increase the explained variance of the base-line model
by 5.2%.
The third set of variables related to direct participation in national commemorations (i.e. in
Memorial Day ceremonies or in public events celebrating Israels 60th anniversary). Such events,
examples of state-sponsored commemoration, are often hypothesized to serve as commemorative
agents alternative to the media, and much memory scholarship is focused on such efforts (see, for
example, Rosenberg etal., 2010). In model 3, however, the two variables were found nonsignificant in affecting the propensity to name Israels establishment as the most important event, when
controlling for media exposure. Media influence thus surpassed the role of direct participation in
public commemoration events.13
495
Discussion
The goal of this study was to empirically examine the influence of the media on collective memory
through an examination of media coverage of Israels 60th anniversary and individuals perceptions of the most important past events. One of the most interesting findings is that, in contrast to
the logic of our argument, despite the documented dramatic increase in the attention paid by Israeli
mainstream media to Israels establishment toward Independence Day, public perceptions of the
importance of that specific event remained unchanged. This might point to the resistance of collective memory to even the strongest efforts to modify it, confirming Schudsons (1992) arguments
about the resistance of the past (p. 205).
But does this mean that the media do not have any influence on the publics perceptions of
important past events? Several of our findings suggest that this is not the case. Consistent with our
argument regarding a memory-setting effect of the media, our results documented a significant
correlation between the media memory-agenda and the public memory-agenda, which was significantly stronger at T2, a time of increased media memory. The stronger correlation between the
media and the public in T2 stems from the fact that at that time point, people were more likely to
mention past events in Israeli history that were mentioned by the media as important. The coverage
of Israels anniversary did not focus merely on the States establishment but rather on its history
beyond its creation. Myriad Israeli past events moved to the forefront of media coverage during the
week of Independence Day, parallel with an increase in the mentioning of major Israeli events
among the public, at the expense of international events and minor Israeli events. Finally, the
individual-level regressions showed that heavier consumers of televised media memory were the
most likely to name the establishment of the State of Israel, and major Israeli events in general, as
the most important events. It is worth noting that both these findings do not represent very strong
effects. Yet, the small magnitude of this effect should be interpreted in light of the fact that media
effects are generally not very powerful (McGuire, 1986).
While these findings establish a key step in supporting the claim of medias influence on collective memory, they do not fully establish that the causal mechanism indeed works from media
exposure to audience perceptions. Alternative explanations exist. First, we could be witnessing
self-selection: it may be that the same people who already cared about the 60th anniversary were
more likely to follow media coverage of the anniversary. Second, reverse causality is possible: we
could conclude that it is the media agenda that has changed in the direction of the public agenda at
T2 rather than vice versa.
As we address these alternative explanations, we acknowledge that only a true experimental
design (i.e. in a laboratory setting) could fully refute them. However, in the field of memory studies, we believe that context is key: we are interested in processes of memory formation based on
real-life circumstances of messy commemoration, in which several mnemonic agents collide.
We thus preferred the naturally occurring commemoration over the control that a laboratory setting
would have enabled us. In future studies, examining media memory in controlled settings may help
substantiate the causal claims of studies such as this, which err on the side of external validity.
The reverse causality argument can be addressed in several ways. First, our quasi-experimental
design helps substantiate our causal interpretation. The correlations between the media and public
memory-agendas increased in T2, after Israels 60th anniversary received a heavy dose of media
attention. Thus, when the salience of media memory increased, the medias ability to set the public
memory-agenda was stronger as well. Second, the causal direction of influence from the media to
the public was empirically substantiated in agenda-setting research (using experiments, longitudinal designs, cross-lagged analyses, and other designs; see Dearing and Rogers, 1996), upon which
we rest our theoretical argument.
496
Memory Studies 7(4)
Finally, the increased correlation between the public and the media memory-agendas during the
high holidays of Israels national calendar might not result from the influence of one variable on
the other, but rather from the enduring influence of Jewish-Israeli civil religion (Liebman and DonYehiya, 1983), especially during this specific time of the year. Durkheim may have seen this as the
effect of a patriotic current shaping all of society (Wallace, 1977). In terms of sheer prominence,
our study might suggest that mainstream Zionist ideology is still potent as an agenda setter for
Israeli-Jewish society, influencing both the media and the public. At the same time, only complementary in-depth textual analysis of media contents and public interpretations can determine the
narrative shaping of media memory, and whether shifts have occurred in how these frequently
mentioned historical events have been interpreted by different groups throughout the years (Meyers,
2002).
The medias role as a mnemonic agent, as limited as it emerged from our study, raises the question
of the potential political consequences of the ability to shape public remembering. After all, collective memory is always a mean for something else (Zelizer, 1995: 226), often for legitimizing current
regimes and social conditions. As seen in the increased extent of media memory as part of Israels
60th anniversary, in this case, the media assume a key role in disseminating state-sponsored commemoration, which has legitimizing functions. Other studies have shown other possible political
effects of collective memory: the past events most salient to individuals have been found to influence
the historical analogies they use to make sense of current events, thus shaping their political evaluation of these events (Schuman and Corning, 2012). It seems that indeed, control of a societys memory largely conditions the hierarchy of power (Connerton, 1989: 1). Future studies can further
investigate the ways in which this elusive form of power operatesfor this purpose, qualitative
approaches such as in-depth interviews or focus groups would be most fruitful.
Finally, this studys findings contribute to the controversy over the interrelations between individual and collective memories. On the one hand, the study suggests that a collective memory
can be said to exist, at least among relatively homogenous groups: Jewish-Israeli Hebrew-speaking
adults generally agreed on what the most important past events are. Moreover, this sense of collective memory was arguably influenced by the media, corroborating the significance of analyzing
public manifestations of collective memory. Yet individuals are far from powerless: some events
were important to the public though they were not salient in the media, nor intentionally commemorated by the state (e.g. the 9/11 attacks were very salient for the public, while almost absent
from mainstream media discourse). In his conception of collective memory, Halbwachs (1952/1992)
gave individuals relatively limited agency in constructing their own understanding of the shared
past. This study, while corroborating Halbwachs thesis on social frameworks of memories, points
to the fact that individual memories cannot be ignored when studying collective memory. While
public commemoration is often reflected by individuals, the unique aspects of individual memory
merit the full attention of memory scholars.
Acknowledgements
The authors thank Motti Neiger, Jonathan Cohen, and Maxwell McCombs, as well as the two anonymous
reviewers, on their insightful comments on previous versions of this article.
Notes
1. While the study did not formally include online outlets, this was partially captured within newspaper
reading: this question included both off-line and online content.
2. The one exception to an event is the category of inventions, which grouped together mentions of the
development of different technologies, such as the phone or the Internet.
497
3. Non-Jews and non-Hebrew speakers are less likely to consume mainstream Israeli media, and are apt to
hold differential collective memories; a fruitful avenue for future research.
4. The response rates according to American Association for Public Opinion Research (AAPOR) formulas:
Refusal rate (RR) 1 T1 = .30, T2 = .25; Cooperation rate (CR) 1 T1 = .53, T2 = .25; Response rate (RR)
1 T1 = .14, T2 = .18.
5. Similar results were obtained for naming one of the three events most salient in the media.
6. The Israeli workweek begins on Sunday and ends on Saturday, so that it was clear to participants that the
question refers to the past workweek.
7. This correlation is also significant using Spearmans Rho, = .937, p < .001.
8. Running the same regressions with a different correlation coefficientSpearmans rho rather than
Pearsons ryields nonsignificant results. The reason is that Pearson takes into account the differences
between the different rankings (which are very significant in these data), whereas Spearman does not.
There are many precedents in agenda-setting studies to use Pearsons r.
9. Major Israeli events include the establishment of the State of Israel, the Holocaust, the Six-Day War,
Second Lebanon War, Rabins Assassination, and Peace with Egypt. The remaining events are the six
Israeli minor Israeli events, and seven international events. The Holocaust was considered as a major
Israeli event. While this is an event that occurred in Europe, before the establishment of Israel, it is
assigned a key role in the narrative of the establishment of the State.
10. For mentioning only the establishment of the State of Israel as the most important event, the amount
of TV content related to the 60th anniversary had an even stronger effect (63% increase for each unit
change).
11. Analysis was also conducted for T1, including demographic variables and media exposure. As in the
model for T2, exposure variables were nonsignificant, strengthening the argument that media influence
stems from type of content, rather than amount of exposure.
12. Interactions between amount of media exposure and amount of commemoration in these media were not
significant, and were omitted.
13. Regressions were also run for the naming of major Israeli events. Similar results were obtained: significant predictors were age and the amount of TV content related to the 60th anniversary.
References
Bar-On M (2001) Smoking Borders: Studies in the Early History of the State of Israel 19481967. Jerusalem,
Israel: Yad Ben-Zvi (Hebrew).
Bourdon J and Kligler-Vilenchik N (2011) Together, nevertheless: television memories in mainstream Jewish
Israel. European Journal of Communication 26(1): 3347.
Cohen BC (1963) The Press and Foreign Policy. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Connerton P (1989) How Societies Remember. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Coser L (1992) Introduction: Maurice Halbwachs 18771945. In: Halbwachs M (ed.) On Collective Memory.
Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press, pp. 136.
Dayan D and Katz E (1992) Media Events: The Live Broadcasting of History. Cambridge, MA: Harvard
University Press.
Dearing JW and Rogers EM (1996) Communication Concepts 6: Agenda Setting. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.
Edy JA (1999) Journalistic uses of collective memory. Journal of Communication 49(2): 7185.
Edy JA (2006) Troubled Pasts: News and the Collective Memory of Social Unrest. Philadelphia, PA: Temple
University Press.
Halbwachs M (1952/1992) On Collective Memory. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.
Huyssen A (2000) Present pasts: media, politics, amnesia. Public Culture 12(1): 2138.
Kansteiner W (2002) Finding meaning in memory: a methodological critique of collective memory studies.
History and Theory 41: 179197.
Kansteiner W (2010) Memory, media and Menschen: where is the individual in collective memory studies?
Memory Studies 3(1): 34.
Kiousis S, Bantimaroudis P and Ban H (1999) Candidate image attributes: experiments on the substantive
dimension of second level agenda setting. Communication Research 26(4): 414428.
498
Memory Studies 7(4)
Kitch C (2005) Pages from the Past: History & Memory in American Magazines. Chapel Hill, NC: The
University of North Carolina Press.
Kligler-Vilenchik N (2011) Memory-setting: applying agenda-setting theory to the study of collective memory. In: Neiger M, Meyers O and Zandberg E (eds) On Media Memory. New York: Palgrave Macmillan,
pp. 226237.
Liebman CS and Don-Yehiya E (1983) Civil Religion in Israel: Traditional Judaism and Political Culture in
the Jewish State. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
McCombs ME and Shaw DL (1972) The agenda-setting function of mass media. Public Opinion Quarterly
36: 176187.
McGuire WJ (1986) The myth of massive media impact: savagings and salvagings. Public Communication
and Behavior 1: 175257.
Meyers O (2002) Still photographs, dynamic memories: A study of the visual presentation of Israels past in
commemorative newspaper supplements. The Communication Review 5(3): 179205.
Meyers O (2007) Memory in journalism and the memory of journalism: Israeli journalists and the constructed
legacy of Haolam Hazeh. Journal of Communication 57(4): 719738.
Meyers O, Zandberg E and Neiger M (2009) Prime time commemoration: an analysis of television broadcasts on Israels Memorial Day for the Holocaust and the Heroism. Journal of Communication 59(3):
456480.
Misztal BA (2003) Durkheim on collective memory. Journal of Classical Sociology 3(2): 123143.
Neiger M, Meyers O and Zandberg E (eds) (2011) On Media Memory: Collective Memory in a New Media
Age. London: Palgrave Macmillan.
Olick JK (1999) Collective memory: the two cultures. Sociological Theory 17(3): 333348.
Ricoeur P (2004) Memory, History, Forgetting. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.
Rosenberg S, Dean A and Granzow K (2010) Centennial hauntings: reckoning with the 2005 celebration of
Albertas history. Memory Studies 3(4): 395412.
Schudson M (1992) Watergate in American Memory: How We Remember, Forget, and Reconstruct the Past.
New York: Basic Books.
Schuman H and Corning A (2012) Generational memory and the critical period: evidence for national and
world events. Public Opinion Quarterly 76(1): 131.
Schuman H and Scott J (1989) Generations and collective memories. American Sociological Review 54(3):
359381.
Schuman H, Vinitzky-Seroussi V and Vinokur A (2003) Keeping the past alive: memories of Israeli Jews at
the turn of the millennium. Sociological Forum 18(1): 103135.
Schwartz B and Schuman H (2000) The Two Meanings of Collective Memory (Newsletter of the Sociology of
Culture). Washington, DC: American Sociological Association, pp. 13.
Volkmer I (ed.) (2006) News in Public Memory: An International Study of Media Memories across
Generations. New York: Peter Lang.
Wallace RA (1977) Emile Durkheim and the civil religion concept. Review of Religious Research 18(3):
287290.
Welzer H (2010) Re-narrations: how pasts change in conversational remembering. Memory Studies 3(1):
517.
Zelizer B (1992) Covering the Body: The Kennedy Assassination, the Media, and the Shaping of Collective
Memory. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.
Zelizer B (1995) Reading the past against the grain: the shape of memory studies. Critical Studies in Mass
Communication 12(2): 214239.
Zelizer B (2008) Why memorys work on journalism does not reflect journalisms work on memory. Memory
Studies 1(1): 7987.
Author biographies
Neta Kligler-Vilenchik is a doctoral candidate at the Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism at
the University of Southern California. Her current research focuses on changing modes of political engagement in the new media context.
499
Yariv Tsfati (Ph.D., University of Pennsylvania, 2002) is Associate Professor at the Department of
Communication, University of Haifa, Israel. His research focuses on various facets of public opinion, in particular on trust in media, the third person effect, and campaign effects.
Oren Meyers (Ph.D., University of Pennsylvania, 2004) is Senior Lecturer at the Department of
Communication, University of Haifa, Israel. His research interests focus on journalistic practices and values,
collective memory and popular culture.

Setting The Collective Memory Agenda Memory Studies-2014-Kligler-Vilenchik-484-99

Enviado por

Dados do documento

Título original

Direitos autorais

Formatos disponíveis

Compartilhar este documento

Compartilhar ou incorporar documento

Opções de compartilhamento

Você considera este documento útil?

Este conteúdo é inapropriado?

Direitos autorais:

Formatos disponíveis

Setting The Collective Memory Agenda Memory Studies-2014-Kligler-Vilenchik-484-99

Enviado por

Direitos autorais:

Formatos disponíveis

Memory

Setting the collective memory agenda: Examining mainstream media influence on

>> Version of Record - Sep 3, 2014

Downloaded from mss.sagepub.com at UNIV FEDERAL DE MINAS GERAIS on November 5, 2014

MSS0010.1177/1750698014523443Memory StudiesKligler-Vilenchik et al.