Review the following list of research questions carefully. Use Google Scholar to learn more about those

topics that interest you. Then, select one research question to investigate for your final paper*:

1. Do negative political campaigns affect democracy?

2. Did social media disrupt the gatekeeping theory in the 2016 U.S. presidential election by

bypassing or replacing the legacy mass media?

3. Are the perceptions of candidate traits shaped by the media?

4. Do established mass communication theories still apply in a digital democracy?

5. How can communication and persuasion be used in the modern political campaign to influence

reasoning voters?

6. Does the proliferation of information sources cause or contribute to the polarization of political

views in the U.S. news media?

7. How does reliance on social media for news and information affect news consumers’

perspectives on the world?

8. Do emerging trends in audience segmentation have the potential to affirm or destabilize a

democracy?

9. What is the emerging relationship between social media and agenda-setting theory?

10. How does the self-selection of news and information affect political views?

11. What is the emerging relationship of social media and the two-step flow of information, and

how might that be affecting U.S. candidate and voter behaviors?

12. What is the role of campaign advertising in a social media world?

13. How has social media use by U.S. political candidates evolved over time?

14. Is competition from an increasing number of alternative news and information technologies and

sources in the United States causing, contributing to, or accelerating bias in U.S. news content?

15. How do political candidates seek to affect the media to frame issues to their advantage?

16. How are the internet and social media affecting the roles of U.S. television, radio, newspapers,

and magazines as gatekeepers?

17. How are media ownership patterns affecting news and information about U.S. politics and

government?

Once you have investigated the research questions and decided which one you want to pursue, write

the 2-page research topic proposal essay or memo to your instructor in which you include the following

elements:

Re-state the research question that you want to pursue;

Explain why the question interests you;

List at least 5 things you already know about the topics-;

List at least 5 things you need to find out about the topic and

State what your proposed thesis or position statement will be on that topic.