Çetin Murat HAZAR

Suha SBOUH

This study was designed to test the Agenda Setting Theory, which is supposed to be one of the important effects of mass media. Agenda setting, one of the theories of mass media research, suggests that mass media is effective in thinking about the topic itself rather than thinking about how this topic should be evaluated. However, each discusses different topics according to their own culture, tradition, view, history and personal characteristics. According to the theory, the efficiency of mass media is not concentrated in the strategy of thinking, on the contrary, it’s found to be effective in thinking about what to think about. The research was based on a face-to-face survey with 740 students from Hacı Bayram Veli University in Ankara, Turkey and An-Najah National University students in Palestine. The public agenda data and the media agenda data, perceived by the students, were listed and the agenda setting effect of the media were tried to be revealed.Within the scope of the study, together with the variables of gender, class and university, the student`s views on their own agendas (the topic most recently emphasized) and the question about the media agenda (the topic that mass media has been dealing with most recently) were evaluated. According to the results of the research; when the media agenda is compared with the public agenda in terms of gender, university and class categories, it is found that the similarity rates among them are quite low. Therefore, Agenda Setting Theory of Mass Communication Hacı Bayram Veli universities in Turkey and An-Najah National University students in Palestine have not been sufficiently effective in their sample.

Keywords: Agenda Setting, Media Agenda, Public Agenda, Need for Orientation, Mass Communication