Georgia State University ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University Sociology Theses Department of Sociology 1-6-2017 Red Show, Blue Show: A Content Analysis of Liberals’ and Conservatives’ Respective Television Favorites Nicholas Rogers Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/sociology_theses Recommended Citation Rogers, Nicholas, "Red Show, Blue Show: A Content Analysis of Liberals’ and Conservatives’ Respective Television Favorites." Thesis, Georgia State University, 2017. https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/sociology_theses/63 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Department of Sociology at ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. It has been accepted for inclusion in Sociology Theses by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. RED SHOW, BLUE SHOW: A CONTENT ANALYSIS OF LIBERALS’ AND CONSERVATIVES’ RESPECTIVE TELEVISION FAVORITES by NICK ROGERS Under the Direction of Ben L. Kail, PhD ABSTRACT Ideological partisans in the United States are increasingly “sorting” themselves along cultural lines, from the cable news stations they watch to the chain restaurants they prefer. How do partisans seem to “know” how to sort themselves along ideological lines in cultural realms that offer no obvious political cues? To investigate this question, I look to the realm of narrative television, where conservatives and liberals have certain unique favorite programs despite the programs lacking any overt political content. I employ a quantitative content analysis to demonstrate that the substance of these polarizing shows relate to the social traits of curiosity, conformity, relativism, dogmatism, tribalism, vigilance, and chastity, which have previously been demonstrated to correspond to political ideology.