Recent changes in the media environment have generated serious debates about whether these changes will foster or hamper the proper functioning of democracy. Along this line, the tendency toward audience fragmentation has arisen as one of the main concerns that might undermine a healthy democracy. People are not likely to discuss common social problems and understand each other in fragmented society, much less agree on methods to solve them. This dissertation investigates whether the environmental changes result in the audience fragmentation. This study first clarifies conceptual and operational definition of fragmentation. It is conceptualized as division of the general public into small groups not communicating with each other, and operationalized as existence of a common agenda by means of incidental news exposure facilitated by structural factors of online communication, an exemplar of the new information environment. Data from several different methods are employed to investigate effects of new media on fragmentation: a content analysis, a survey, and a laboratory experiment. The results provide evidence supporting that the public still can share experiences by learning a common agenda from the media on the Internet, the medium considered an icon of the new media environment. Findings of the content analysis found significant positive correlations between news agenda of different media outlets, indicating that there is a common agenda in the media. Environmental factors of the media environment rather than individual differences in political predispositions have strong influence on people’s incidental news exposure, a key route to acquire a common agenda. A series of analyses based on the survey found that overall frequency of Internet use significantly predicted individuals’ reports of incidental news exposure online, whereas there was no significant relationship between political predispositions and incidental exposure. It also appears that certain online activities such as getting entertainment/sports information significantly predicted the incidental news exposure. The incidental news exposure was found to have actual effects on people’s learning of a common agenda and recognition/recall of information carried by stimulus messages in the experiment. The implications of the findings are discussed in terms of communication research and media/democracy. / text

Public service broadcasting is a longstanding broadcasting institution in Sweden. Being the most consumed and highly trusted media broadcasting institution on the market, it suffers both challenges and acclaim. It has become a highly politized matter. For the first time since its founding, trust and attitudes towards the public service broadcasting companies are starting to slowly dwindle and are being questioned. Representatives from parliament parties are calling for abolishment and restructuring, and the consumers are abandoning the public service broadcasting channels for commercial competitors. This is especially noticeable amongst youth. The aim of the study is to identify and analyse what factors can be relevant for understanding attitudes towards public service broadcasting. With a theoretical background in Markus Prior’s post-broadcast democracy, James G. Webster and Thomas B. Ksiazek’s audience fragmentation theory, and Strömbäck’s definition of media trust, a theoretical framework regarding consumption and factors concerning attitudes was constructed. Through this, the value of a public service broadcasting system could be charted, and consumer attitudes be understood.   The study consists of data from a nationwide survey. The data was analysed with binary logistic regression analysis, performed on two samples, one representing the Swedish population at large, and one representing youth. This to observe whether or not there were any differences between what factors constitute trust and positive attitudes towards public service broadcasting. Main findings include that youth is much less politically polarised than the population at large. Factors such as education, gender, and regularly consuming public service broadcasting content were also shown to be significant for attitude formation. From this, I could derive that the Swedish population, despite increased polarisation, still has very high levels of trust in, and positive sentiments towards the public service broadcasting company SVT.