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People tend to over estimate the power of political messages to influence other’s opinions, a new study shows. In an experiment, people who viewed negative political advertising said the advertisements had little effect on their own opinions, but believed the ads would have a greater influence on others.

“People have a tendency to overestimate the media’s impact, especially when we don’t necessarily like the message,” says Fuyuan Shen, associate professor of communications at Penn State. “And this belief could have larger behavioral implications on censorship and the regulation of media content.”

Full story at Futurity.

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