New Media, Civic Learning, and Civic Action Among Young People
44 Pages Posted: 19 Jan 2013
There are 2 versions of this paper
New Media, Civic Learning, and Civic Action Among Young People
New Media, Civic Learning, and Civic Action Among Young People
Date Written: January 18, 2013
Abstract
Political apathy and ignorance are endemic among young people and many agree that improving civic education is tantamount to improving public awareness. How to go about inspiring engagement among young people, however, remains a topic of debate. For example, students who report on surveys that they were encouraged to express their political views in the classroom were also more politically engaged. But this might occur because students who were already engaged reported more opportunities to express political views. Spurious relationships could also occur because educators are more likely to undertake service learning, for example, when their students come from higher SES backgrounds. Experiments and long-term observation that could provide greater certainty about causal links have been rare. This paper presents results of a classroom-based experiment designed to assess whether students’ enthusiasm for “new media” (e.g. blogs) can be harnessed in American politics courses to stimulate long lasting political engagement.
Keywords: civic engagement, participation, voter turnout, new media, blogging, political science teaching, field experiment
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