How Authoritarian Social Contexts Inform Individuals' Opinion Perception and Expression

Stella C. Chia (PhD. 2003, University of Wisconsin-Madison) is an associate professor in the Department of Media and Communication at the City University of Hong Kong. Her research interests include media effects, journalism and public opinion, adolescent behavior, and new media. She wants to thank Tsan-Kuo Chang and Ivan Kwek Eng Tai for giving valuable advices to this project. In public debates surrounding controversial issues, news reports, and perceived public opinion are particularly crucial. Public opinion models, such as the spiral of silence, indicate that people form impressions of public opinion through exposure to news reports in the media. Although perhaps inaccurate at times, perceptions of public opinion affect whether people are willing to participate in public debate and express their opinions in public (Taylor, 1982). Over the years, studies have vigorously used diverse theories and methodologies in attempting to disentangle the process by which people assess the climate of public opinion through news coverage (e.g., exemplar effect and base rate information, Brosius & Bathelt, 1994, Gibson & Zillmann, 1994; persuasive press inference, Gunther, 1998). However, these studies do not consider all possible ways in which social contexts may be operationalized. Specifically, the press system in a society often affects news coverage and audiences’ judgments of news slant (Chia, Yong, Wong, & Koh, 2007; Giner-Sorolla & Chaiken, 1994). How people account for social context when relating news reports to public sentiment deserves further examinations. In addition to perceptions of public opinion, individuals’ readiness to voice personal opinions publicly is often subject to social context. For example, in authoritarian countries, people’s willingness to voice opinions may be a function of their perceptions of the government's stance, and individuals are likely to refrain from expressing opinions that appear to contradict the authority. However, this tendency does not indicate that individuals’ perceptions of public opinion are not relevant in such a context. On the contrary, individuals’ perceptions of public support have such an impact that even authoritarian states have to concern themselves with managing perceived public opinion. For example, state-owned media in authoritarian regimes tend to highlight the consensus among people and the popularity of policies and political leadership (Chang, 1999). This tendency reflects the attempts of authoritarian governments to influence not only the opinions of individuals but also their perceptions of public opinion regarding government policies and leadership. Thus, how perceptions of the authority and perceived public opinion may be concurrently associated with people’s opinion expression in such a context becomes an intriguing question. Singapore, which ranks 149th in the world press freedom index (Reporters without Borders, 2013), provides an ideal location for such an examination. Although it permits private ownership of the press, the Singapore government requires the press to renew their permits and licenses annually. The government also controls operations within the press by requiring newspapers to issue management shares (which command voting powers that are 200 times greater than that of ordinary shares) only to parties that are approved by the government (Tan & Soh, 1994). Such a context enables us to observe how a regulated press system interacts with the public’s exposure to news, perception of public opinion, and expression of personal opinion. We choose the ongoing debate regarding lifting the ban on the sale of human organs in Singapore as the context of this study. Organ trading is a controversial topic that has been intensely debated in many countries, including Singapore, where the waiting list for a kidney transplant is up to nine years because of the scarcity of donors (Ritter, 2008). Supporters of organ trading argue that it is not wrong to offer monetary incentives to potential living donors, provided that a competent doctor has first determined that there are no health risks. However, opponents are concerned that only wealthy patients will be able to afford organs and that the poor will be the primary sellers, which will further jeopardize their health (January 18, 2007, The Straits Times, page H6). In contrast to the polarized perspectives presented by the two contending factions, the position assumed by the Singapore government appears rather ambiguous. Singapore has retained its strict penalties against organ trading and has declared that offering financial incentives for organ donation is morally and legally wrong (Channel News Asia, 2009). Nevertheless, the government permits financial reimbursement to living donors and has urged citizens to carefully review the idea of legalizing organ sales rather than utterly rejecting the notion (Tan & Tan, 2008). In view of the ambivalent messages sent by the government, Singaporeans’ interpretations of the government’s position may lean in either direction, which allows us to examine how perceptions of the news reports are associated with various interpretations of governmental opinion and affect individuals’ opinion perception and expression. Research in the past decade has argued for a process in which people infer public opinion from their perceptions of general media bias and from the assumed influence of media coverage, which is termed “persuasive press inference” (Gunther, 1998). The underlying rationale is based on three propositions. First, people tend to extrapolate general news content from the news coverage to which they are exposed. Based on the small amount of news coverage that they view, people judge general news content to be slanted in one direction or another. Second, people believe that slanted news coverage has a broad scope that reaches most other people. Third, people expect that news coverage has a significant persuasive influence on the attitudes and opinions of others. As a result, people tend to infer a climate of public opinion that reflects not only their own personal opinions (i.e., projection effect, Field & Schuman, 1976; also see Christen & Gunther, 2003) but also their impressions of general news content. In the public opinion process, perceptions of public opinion can be divided into perceptions of the current opinion climate and perceptions of future opinion trends. Perceptions of the current opinion climate refer to the rough impressions of the relative proportion held by contending opinions, whereas perceptions of future opinion trends refer to individuals’ predictions of what the prevailing opinion will be in future (Petric & Pinter, 2002; Taylor, 1982). Previous studies of persuasive press inference suggest that people not only estimate public opinion based on the news slant but also perceive public opinion to change in the direction of the news slant (Gunther, 1998; Gunther & Christen, 1999). It is reasonable to expect that people’s estimates of current opinion distribution and their predictions of future opinion trends will correspond to their individual impressions of news coverage. H1: In the context of legalizing organ trading in Singapore, people’s perceptions of the slant of relevant news coverage is positively associated with their perceptions of (a) the current opinion distribution and (b) future opinion trends, after their personal opinions are controlled. People do not consume news in a vacuum. Rather, their reading of news coverage is often associated with the social context within which news stories are reported. In authoritarian societies, such as Singapore, citizens are fully aware of the government's tight press control (Chia & Cenite, 2012; Tan, Hao, & Chen, 1998). It is natural for them to assume that news reports constitute references only to opinions that are endorsed by the government. The persuasive press inference would further lead them to perceive public support for these opinions. As a result, in the case of a government stance that is perceived to be consistent with one’s own opinion, such a person is likely to report perceptions of a congenial public. Conversely, when personal opinion contrasts with the government’s stance, the relative strength of the perceived social agreement may decrease. H2: In the context of legalizing organ trading in Singapore, people who perceive the government’s stance to be congruent with their own opinions are more likely than others to believe that their views (a) are currently or (b) will be predominant. The most prominent explanation for the link between perceptions of public opinion and opinion expression is provided by Noelle-Neumann’s well-known spiral of silence theory (1993). The spiral of silence theory begins with the assumption that public opinion plays the role of an omnipresent “public eye” that exerts pressure on people to conform. Fearful of becoming socially isolated, individuals use their “quasi-statistical sense” to assess the current and future climate of public opinion. If people perceive that their own opinions are congruent with the majority’s voice or with the prevailing opinion, they are confident and willing to express their opinions. On the other hand, if individuals find that their views are in the minority or are losing ground, they become uncertain and avoid expressing their opinions in public (Noelle-Neumann, 1993, also see Taylor, 1982). Willnat, Lee, & Detenber (2002) tested the spiral of silence theory in Singapore with respect to two controversial issues—interracial marriage and gay rights. They failed to find any correlation between opinion congruence and outspokenness for the issue of interracial marriage. For gay rights, future opinion congruence appeared to be positively associated with outspokenness, which was consistent with the spiral of silence. However, they also found that people with lower levels of current opinion congruence were more likely to express their views. In view of these mixed results, we propose a research question to examine whether opinion congruence is negatively or positively associated with individuals’ willingness to voice their opinions regarding the issue of legalizing organ trading. RQ: In the context of legalizing organ trading in Singapore, would congruence between personal opinion and perceptions of (a) the current climate of public opinion and (b) the trend of future opinion be positively or negatively associated with individuals’ willingness to express personal opinions? In Singapore, however, people often refrain from expressing their views when they believe that the government disagrees with their opinions (Leong, 2000). Willnat, Lee, & Detenber (2002) suggested that the fear of governmental sanction is an additional factor driving the decision to remain silent in this authoritarian country. The government in Singapore exercises high levels of regulation over the state’s politics, economy, and media. For citizens in Singapore, expressing dissenting views is likely to entail negative consequences (Willnat, Lee, & Detenber, 2002). Thus, individuals in Singapore are likely to avoid challenging the government and to voice their beliefs only when their opinions are congruent with the government. H3: In the context of legalizing organ trading in Singapore, congruence between personal opinions and interpretations of the government’s position is positively associated with individuals’ willingness to express opinions. A national probability sample of 520 Singaporean adults who reported being exposed to news coverage pertaining to the issue of organ trading in previous months was interviewed for this study using a computer-assisted telephone interview (CATI) system.1 The youngest male/oldest female technique was used to randomize respondents within households. With the exception of ineligible and unqualified numbers (e.g., disconnected or fax), each telephone number was attempted six times. Refusals were called back up to three times. The response rate was 23%.2 A comparison of the survey respondents with updated census data (Singapore Census, 2010) suggests that the sample was largely representative of the Singaporean population in terms of gender and ethnicity, although people with low levels of education, people of high income, and those <40 years old were slightly undersampled. The respondents were first asked to report their perception of news slant.3 We asked the respondents: “Would you say that news coverage on the whole has been favorable or unfavorable toward the legalization of organ trading, or has it been fairly neutral?” If the respondents replied “favorable,” they were asked: “Would that be very favorable, somewhat favorable, or only a little favorable?” A parallel question also followed the “unfavorable” response. These three items were combined to produce a seven-point scale ranging from −3, very unfavorable, to +3, very favorable, with 0 as a neutral midpoint (M = 0.24, SD = 1.40).4 We then asked respondents the following questions: “What is your own opinion on the issue of legalization of organ trading? Would you say that you support (+1), oppose (−1), or neither support nor oppose it (0)?” (M = 0.18, SD = 0.78) and “Would you say that the government supports (+1), opposes (−1), or neither support nor oppose it (0)?” (M = 0.21, SD = 0.80). The respondents’ personal opinions were subtracted from their perceptions of the government’s stance to create a variable of congruence with the government. A difference of 0 was coded as full congruence (+3), differences of +1 and −1 were coded as some incongruence (+2), and differences of +2 and −2 were coded as full incongruence (+1) (M = 2.40, SD = 0.70). Subsequently, the respondents were asked to assess the percentage of Singaporeans who supported legalizing organ trading on a 10-point scale, where 1 indicated 0–10% and 10 indicated 91–100% (M = 44.03%, SD = 20.25%).5 We recoded the respondents as +1 when they perceived that >50% of Singaporeans supported legalization of organ trading and −1 when they perceived that ≤50% Singaporeans supported it. The respondents’ personal opinions were subtracted from the recoded scores to create a variable of current opinion congruence, which ranged from full congruence (+3) to full incongruence (+1) (M = 2.13, SD = 0.80). We also asked the respondents to gauge prevailing opinion in the near future.6 Responses were given on the same 10-point percentage scale that was used earlier (M = 51.98%, SD = 24.71%). As before, we compared the respondents’ predictions of future opinion trends to their personal opinions and created a variable of future opinion congruence ranged from full congruence (+3) to full incongruence (+1) (M = 2.27, SD = 0.78). Respondents’ willingness to publicly express personal opinions was measured on a five-point scale (with 1 indicating “not willing at all” and 5 indicating “very willing”) using four questions: “If you were at a gathering where you knew only half of the people, would you be willing to express your personal opinion if the topic of organ trading legalization arises?” (M = 3.14, SD = 1.02); “Would you be willing to sign a petition to express your personal opinion on the issue of organ trading legalization in Singapore?” (M = 2.86, SD = 1.02); “If your MP (member of parliament) organized a feedback session7 on legalizing organ trading, would you be willing to express your opinion there?” (M = 2.85, SD 1.00); and “If you were approached by a television news crew to state your views on the issue of organ trading legalization on prime-time news, would you be willing to express your opinion?” (M = 2.55, SD = 1.07). The four questions formed a composite measure (α = 0.77, M = 2.17, SD = 0.59).8 Finally, we obtained standard demographic information, including respondents’ age (M = 39.51, SD = 15.30), gender (45.7% males), race (75.6% Chinese), religion (26.5% without a religion), education (M = 5.20, SD = 1.49, i.e., postsecondary school), and combined household income per month (M = $4,520, SD = $2,326). H1 posits that individuals’ perceptions of news slant would be positively associated with their estimates of current and future opinion distributions. To test the hypotheses, we performed two sets of hierarchical multiple regression analyses.9 As Table 1 demonstrates, the respondents’ perceptions of news slant appeared significantly associated with their perceptions of current opinion distribution and future opinion distribution. Both H1a and H1b were supported. Consistent with the projection effect, respondents’ personal opinions were associated with their perceptions of the opinion climate. Standardized Linear Regression Coefficients for Predicting Perceptions of the Current Opinion Climate and Future Opinion Trends ***p < .001; **p < .01; *p < .10. Standardized Linear Regression Coefficients for Predicting Perceptions of the Current Opinion Climate and Future Opinion Trends ***p < .001; **p < .01; *p < .10. Next, we performed two-way contingency table analyses with chi-square statistics to evaluate whether congruence with the government stance on organ trading would lead people to consider their opinions to be predominant or winning, as In the respondents to believe that their opinions were by the with the government not lead more people to view themselves as the = was not supported. However, congruence with government more people to believe that their would the majority’s support in the future = < see was supported. for respondents who reported congenial public for respondents who reported contrast public for and for by congruence of personal opinion and perceived government stance those who supported or to legalizing organ trading were The and to test whether current opinion congruence, future opinion congruence, and congruence with the government are each associated with individuals’ willingness to express opinions. We performed a of hierarchical multiple regression analyses using the three congruence items as As Table current opinion congruence was not associated with respondents’ willingness to express opinions. future opinion congruence was positively associated with respondents’ willingness to express opinions at MP feedback or on from congruence with the government was not associated with respondents’ willingness to voice their opinions. was not supported. Standardized Linear Regression Coefficients Predicting the to **p < .01; *p < *p < .10. Standardized Linear Regression Coefficients Predicting the to **p < .01; *p < *p < .10. Finally, we found that the respondents were more willing to express opinions in social whereas the respondents were more willing to express opinions on with levels of education were also more willing to sign a petition Table This study has a number of First, persuasive press inference, the notion that perceived slant of press may influence perceptions of public opinion, support in authoritarian in The respondents in this study a between press coverage and the opinions of others. perceptions of future opinion trend also to the press content that they These suggest that people in Singapore believe that the media are be what the public will be (Gunther, Such an from the assumption that the news media have a persuasive influence on other people. the of this study suggest that people’s reading of news and their inference of the public opinion climate are subject to the social context within which the news media The respondents in this study the government’s stance from the slant of the press because they were aware of media regulation in however, they not believe that the government’s stance was the predominant view in As the projection effect the respondents to believe that their views were by the even when they perceived incongruence between their opinion and the government This tendency likely we failed to find a significant between congruence with government and perceptions of a congenial public. However, because the respondents the press as a persuasive of the government, they that the press would influence the public to support the government’s stance in the those who with the government greater than those who with the government with respect to the of the support of the in the who perceived their own opinions to be with the government’s stance to that their views were losing This that persuasive press inference would the projection effect when individuals find news to be & Christen, 2002). study provides support for the spiral of silence We not find to that current opinion congruence is associated with individuals’ willingness to express opinions. However, we found that future opinion congruence was positively associated with individuals’ willingness to express opinions in public. explanation may in that the would with them people more what they may up As when future this future support for one’s people do not to the social in expressing their views. We failed to find a significant between congruence with the government and the willingness of respondents to express opinion. explanation is that the government stance on the issue has not been The government in Singapore has appeared with respect to organ trading and has views for of government was not a driving factor for the respondents to refrain from expressing opinions. Future studies this various social and political in which the government has a and be in based on and as the data of this study from a the low response rate and slightly may the of the In although study to examine opinion only the willingness to to the expression of Finally, the respondents in this study were asked to report their personal opinions, perceptions of the press, perceptions of the and perceptions of the government, and the of these questions may have their Future studies may consider the of the These the of this study suggest that authoritarian governments do not to individuals’ freedom of or As as the government a social in which people are to believe that the popularity of their opinion is or that the government position is dissenting are likely to be a the suggests that citizens in an authoritarian be aware that the climate of public opinion is not the function of public It may be created by the authority to state The study was supported by a from the of Communication and