Agenda Setting in the Internet Age: The Reciprocity Between Online Searches and Issue Salience

When individuals navigate the Internet, their compass is a search engine. Approximately 90 % of Internet users use search engines (Zickuhr, 2010) and turn to them first when searching for news (‘‘Views of the news, " 2011). As of June 2012, Americans had conducted 17 billion searches in a month (Flosi, 2012), the number of which indicates the immensity of information being sought, provided, and consumed through online searches. This observation suggests the possibility that online searches may be an important element in the processes of public opinion formation. With most online searches being intended for information consumption, search volume of an issue may indicate the issue’s public salience because the salience of an issue transfers in the process o