Access Attitudes: A Social Learning Approach to Examining Community Engagement and Support for Press Access to Government Records

Abstract

This survey-based study examines public attitudes toward press access to government records, deriving a political model predicting support for freedom of information based on social learning theory and testing whether support for press access is best explained by societal power, media importance, or political attitudes. Findings indicate that support is tied most closely to political attitudes such that the strongest predictors are community engagement and support for press rights, regardless of age, income, education, newspaper reading, or other variables. The results offer insights to help journalists, scholars, and citizens understand -and perhaps influence-public attitudes towardfreedom of information.Democracy relies on political participation, aided through an informed electorate able to gather information about its government.' Citizens count on journalists as proxies to access police reports, city budgets, bridge inspections, property tax records, and other public documents.2 Yet, in recent decades increased government secrecy through legislation,3 court rulings,4 and policy changes has severely restricted press and citizen access to record^.^ As a result of increased secrecy, journalists say they are unable to adequately monitor government6 and some express worry that the public does not notice-or care:Public opinion toward open government is likely to influence policy decisions, including federal and state legislation, responsiveness to public records requests by officials, and court decisions.8 In recent years the public has demonstrated increased support for secrecy because of fear of terrorist attacks9 and privacy invasion.'O Little research, however, has examined how people think about access to public records and what factors are related to support and nonsupport. A few studies have identified basic demographic correlates of support for access," but they have been limited by a lack of psychographic and political vari-

Engagement with Online Media

“…Even more widely used among journalists and journalism scholars is an alternative approach to engagement in terms of community connection or participation (Mersey, 2009a and2009b;Cuillier, 2008;Kwak, Shah, & Holbert, 2004;Kwak, Williams, Wang, & Lee, 2005;McLeod, Kosicki, & McLeod, 2002;McLeod, Scheufele, & Moy, 1999;Moy & Scheufele, 2000;Moy, Scheufele, & Holbert, 1999;Norris, 1996;Rothenbuhler, Mullen, DeLaurell, & Ryu, 1996;Shah, 1998;Shah, McLeod, & Yoon, 2001;Shah, Schmierbach, Hawkins, Espino, & Donovan, 2002;Stamm, Emig, & Hesse, 1997). We will call this the "civic experience."…”

Public Records Officers' Perspectives on Transparency and Journalism

“…Another important area of sociological research on the transparency process involves public opinion toward transparency. In a survey of a random sample of the U.S. population, Cuillier (2008) found that support for the press and its role in democracy is associated with higher levels of favorability toward granting access to public records. In another study relying on a random-sample survey of residents in the U.S. state of Washington, Cuillier and Pinkleton (2011) found that political liberalism, skepticism, and cynicism were strongly correlated with support for government transparency.…”

“…The first group of statements explores opinions toward government transparency in general. These statements are based on studies by Cuillier (2008;Cuillier & Pinkleton, 2011) that have explored attitudes toward transparency among the general public. In particular, statements seek to address the extent to which public records officers feel a duty toward transparency versus a duty toward protecting their agency through keeping records secret (see Table 2, below, for questions).…”

Systematic Review of Quantitative Measures of Stakeholder Engagement

“…We excluded 179 articles at the final coding stage because they ultimately did not meet our eligibility criteria when the full‐length article was coded and discussed. A total of 68 articles contained quantified measures of stakeholder engagement and met our final criteria …”