Candidate Images in Presidential Elections

by Kenneth L. Hacker

Overview

Since Nimmo and Savage's groundbreaking work, Candidates and Their Images (1976), there has been no book dedicated solely to the examination of political candidate images. This volume adds to the development of the candidate image construct initiated by Nimmo and Savage. It provides a compendium of state-of-the-art theory and research of candidate images and image formation in the U.S. presidential elections. The contributors to this work, among the best-known in the field of political communication, describe and explain how presidential election results hinge on voter perceptions of candidates and how candidates seek to construct images that attract the most votes. The volume integrates issues of voter decision-making, media messages, campaigning, debate effects, and political advertising into the development of political communication theory. It will be a valuable resource for scholars and students of political communication.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780275951610
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	09/14/1995
Series:	Political Communication Series
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	224
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.52(d)
Lexile:	1430L (what's this?)

About the Author

KENNETH L. HACKER is Assistant Professor of Communication Studies at New Mexico State University in Las Cruces. He holds degrees from Sonoma State University, California State University at Sacramento, and the University of Oregon. He has presented numerous papers and published articles and book chapters about political communication, with a primary focus on political images, language, and politics, and voter discourse and candidate images. His primary focus in studying candidate images is to describe and explain how voters influence each other through conversation and how that influence modifies their perceptions of candidates. He is also researching the effects of computer-mediated communication on political communication.

Table of Contents

Foreword by Robert Denton
Introduction: The Importance of Candidate Images by Kenneth L. Hacker
Campaigns and Candidate Images in American Presidential Elections by Susan A. Hellweg
Political Images and Voting Decisions by Kathleen E. Kendall and Scott C. Paine
Creating the Eye of the Beholder: Candidate Images and Political Socialization by Robert L. Savage
The Formation of Candidate Images during Presidential Campaigns by Dan Nimmo
Interpersonal Communication and the Construction of Candidate Images by Kenneth L. Hacker
Changing Candidate Images: The Effects of Political Advertising by Lynda Lee Kaid and Mike Chanslor
Televised Presidential Debates and Candidate Images by Walter R. Zakahi and Kenneth L. Hacker
Meta-analysis of Candidate Images by Susan A. Hellweg and Brian H. Spitzberg
Measuring Candidate Images with Semantic Differentials by Lynda Lee Kaid
Intensive Analysis and Candidate Images by Dan Nimmo
A Rashomonian Approach to the Study of Image Construction by Doug Kruse and Kathleen E. Kendall
Linguistic Discourse Analysis of Candidate Image Formulations by Kenneth L. Hacker
References
Index

Editorial Reviews

Examines the effects of messages and message strategies on candidate images held by voters, what those images contain, and how candidate images are constructed in presidential campaigns. Covers traditional as well as innovative approaches, and discusses images and voting decisions, political socialization, the effects of political advertising and televised debates, meta-analysis of candidate images, and linguistic discourse analysis of image formulation. For students and practitioners of presidential campaign communication. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

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