Effects of Media Use on Complexity and Extremity of Attitudes Toward the Death Penalty and Prisoners' Rehabilitation

This study examined informational antecedents of cognitive complexity, and its effect on extremity of support for two crime policy proposals. The results of the survey conducted with a probability sample of 395 adult residents of Madison, Wisconsin, show that high complexity of thinking, determined by the levels of differentiation and integration in open-ended responses, is related to more neutral attitudes toward the death penalty and prisoners' rehabilitation. The study shows that media use may indirectly affect strength of support for the death penalty relative to prisoners' rehabilitation through its influence on complexity. Exposure and attention to more complex media formats is related to more complex thinking, whereas exposure and attention to more simple media formats inhibits complexity.