Explain and analyse three ways the media influences how people vote.
A way in which the media can influence the ways that people vote is through opinion polls. Opinion polls are surveys taken that aim to gauge how the country will vote and subsequently model how an election would look if it was held that day. This influences the way people vote as it can lead to tactical voting, where people vote for a party that has more of a chance of winning against a party they dislike rather than the party they resonate with. For example, at the by-election held in Tiverton and Honiton in 2022, opinion polling suggested that the left-leaning vote was split between Labour and the Liberal Democrats. However, the Liberal Democrats saw a huge increase in vote share and won the election, showing that opinion polls are an important element in determining how people will vote.
This paragraph jumps straight into the argument by setting out one of the three points. It gives a good example to back it up and explains in detail how opinion polls can influence how people vote.
Another way in which the media can influence the way people vote is through TV broadcasts. Programmes like party leader debates, in which party leaders debate each other, have a great impact on how the party leader and, therefore, the party are viewed by the electorate. The most notable example of this was during the 2017 general election campaign, in which Theresa May failed to turn up to a televised debate and was replaced by Home Secretary Amber Rudd. This led to many questioning May’s integrity and asking where she was to miss putting her policies to the public. Subsequently, the Conservatives lost their parliamentary majority, showing how televised debates and broadcasts can influence the ways in which people vote.