Effects of Salience Dimensions of Informational Utility on Selective Exposure to Online News

Abstract
An Internet newsmagazine was created to ascertain effects of three dimensions of news salience—magnitude, likelihood, and immediacy of events—on selective news exposure. In an overview, leads of half the articles were manipulated along the salience dimensions (low vs. high). Remaining leads and all articles were held constant. While readers sampled articles, their selective exposure was automatically recorded. Independent manipulation of salience dimensions resulted in increased exposure to associated articles for all three dimensions. Their joint manipulation yielded the same results for magnitude and likelihood. The absence of interactions in the joint manipulation suggests additive dimension effects.

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