Using a theoretical frame of cultural studies and social constructivism, I analyze data collected from 15 Americans born between 1965 and 1978-"Generation X'ers"-about how they remember and understand the significance of their popular communication tastes and practices for their political socialization, or what I choose to call individual political development. This study finds that these tastes and practices have had quasi-intentional, functional importance for individual political development in this generation, importance best described as media "uses and effects." While also theorizing about the implications of the postmodern era in which "Generation X'ers" and others have lived, this work speaks to the importance of incorporating individual developmental processes and meaning-making into work on the political implications of mass media and popular communication.
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Marco Calavita (2004) studied this question.