GOP Voters More Likely to Use Newspapers

By: Gregory Solman (Adweek.com) Voters in Democratic districts of California relied mostly on the televised debate and network and cable news to make their decisions in the gubernatorial recall. Those in GOP districts more often sought out information from newspapers and cyberspace.

Those are the top-line findings in Initiative Media's most recent analysis of media usage and attitudes toward political ads among 500 participants in an online survey. "Republicans seem to make their decisions based more on print-based media, the Internet and newspapers, whereas Democrats tend toward electronic, sound-and-image-based media such as television," said Stacey Lynn Koerner, director of global research integration at Interpublic Group's Initiative in New York. "Republicans were seeking to control their information-gathering experience and as a group tend to watch television less. The difference in the media is depth: Network news is much more packaged."

Koerner added that "voters are now accustomed to searching for information they need by consulting multiple sources of media."

Given the clout of conservative talk radio, data about that medium's usage may be surprising: Democrats and Republicans relied on talk radio in equal measure -- about one person in every four.

Regardless of party affiliation, the news anchor voters said they turned to most for political information was CBS's Dan Rather, at 31%. He was followed by ABC's Peter Jennings (21%) NBC's Tom Brokaw (20%) and Fox's Bill O'Reilly (17%).