Dems Hold Advantages in Air War in Senate and House;
GOP Airs More Ads in Gubernatorial Races
(MIDDLETOWN, CT) September 16, 2014 – In the past two weeks, advertising in federal and gubernatorial races has not only increased in volume compared to the same period in 2010, but is more negative as well. Democratic advertising has outpaced Republicans advertising over the past two weeks in House and Senate races, while Republicans hold an edge in gubernatorial races.
2012 Campaign Advertising Volume Crushed Previous Records;
Interest Group and Dark Money Analyses in the Works
(MIDDLETOWN, CT) Feb. 14, 2013 – Two comprehensive studies of the campaign ad trends from the 2012 election have been published by the researchers from the Wesleyan Media Project.
“Negative, Angry, and Ubiquitous: Political Advertising in 2012” by Erika Franklin Fowler of Wesleyan University and Travis N. Ridout of Washington State University, and “Interest Groups in Electoral Politics: 2012 in Context” by Michael Franz of Bowdoin College, appear in the most recent issue of The Forum, a Journal of Applied Research in Contemporary Politics. Read a summary of these publications on the blog of the Knight Foundation, a major funder of the Wesleyan Media Project.
Over 900,000 Ads Aired in Presidential General Election Race;
Over 210,000 Ads since October 1;
President Continues to Hold Ad Advantage in Key Markets;
Independent Groups and Obama Campaign Most Likely to Use Pure Attack Ads
(MIDDLETOWN, CT) Oct. 24, 2012 – Over 915,000 presidential ads have been aired on broadcast and national cable television since June 1. This is a 44.5 percent increase from the 637,000 ads aired through October 21 in 2008 and a 43.7 percent increase from the 634,000 ads aired through October 21 in 2004. See Figure 1.
President Holds Advantage in 14 of 15 Top Markets;
Only 7.8 Percent of Presidential Ads Positive;
FCC electronic disclosure leaves out more than 50% of federal ads
(MIDDLETOWN, CT) Oct. 3, 2012 – In the three-week period since the parties’ national conventions, Barack Obama and his party and interest group allies have continued to dominate the airwaves in the battleground presidential states. From September 9 to September 30, Obama held an ad advantage in 14 of the 15 most advertised media markets in the key states of Virginia, Ohio, and Florida (Table 1). In the top 15 markets, pro-Romney advertising outpaced pro-Obama advertising only in Las Vegas, Nevada. (At the end of this report is a listing of advertising in all battleground media markets, Table 15.)
Pro-Obama Advertisers Had Over 2 to 1 Advantage in Last Two Weeks; Romney Heavily Reliant on Outside Groups; Negative Ads Up Sharply from 2008
(MIDDLETOWN, CT) – Although the Romney campaign has (until recently) dominated the money race, the Obama campaign dominated the broadcast airwaves in the two weeks during the presidential conventions.
As Table 1 shows, during the August 26 to September 8 period, Obama and his allies aired 40,000 ads on broadcast and national cable television, the vast majority of which were paid for by the Obama campaign. By comparison, Romney and his allies aired roughly 18,000 ads on broadcast and national cable television during that same time period.
Super PACs Sponsor Bulk of Presidential Ads; Obama, Crossroads GPS Battle in Same States
(MIDDLETOWN, CT) – The 2012 presidential race is shaping up to be an overwhelmingly negative one, much more negative than the 2008 contest to date. As Table 1 shows, 7 out of 10 of the ads aired in this year’s presidential contests have been negative—that is, they mentioned an opponent. This compares to fewer than 1 in 10 ads aired during the 2008 presidential race up to this point that were negative.
Positive advertising matters as much if not more than negativity
(Middletown, CT) – In the midst of perhaps the most negative presidential primary race in recent history, a new Wesleyan Media Project affiliated study (click here for an older local copy) published by Political Research Quarterly suggests that the tone of ads on the airwaves is not the only thing contributing to citizen perceptions of negativity.
