.Lttitudes; *Political Influences; Public Affairs

ABSTRACT.f:n thi/. paper, the possibility of. abidirectional' relationship between mass%sedia use and political participation and a posible interaction.cf sex with other model-variables'are examined. A Two-Stage Least Squares analysis explores the mtOtfal causation of sass media use and political,particdpation, and/eeparate,analyses'for male and female respondentgexplore-the-sealnteractiOns. Data are from a 1971 survey of North Carolina. Mass edia-use,is shown,to have an effect on ' political participation in both the saie,and.female subsamples... Politital activity has a.positive return effect on media use in the fesale.subsample only. Results indicate that tbdels which specify media use as a unidirectional cause of participation,behavior are probably incorrect. Sitice empirical observations can lead to accurate inferences about the nature- of.a.system only when the causal, model is Correctly specified, this analysissuggests wider use of techniques which allow the investigation of onrecursiv