A test of a model of magazine exposure and appraisal in India

Typically, studies of media exposure and appraisal have concentrated on loosely related characteristics of individuals. This study attempts to link directly individual evaluations of a particular medium to these two variables. Three independent variables are posited to determine exposure and appraisal: editorial tone, communication potential, and utility. The former two variables refer to message content attributes and the latter variable represents a respondent's direct judgment of the usefulness of a particular medium. The causal model that results from this framework is tested on two separate readership surveys of magazines conducted in India. While the causal model provides a good fit to the data in both tests, the results suggest that a contingency approach, based on specific attributes of the medium and situational factors, may be necessary to predict the directionality of specific paths.