Mainstreaming, resonance, and impersonal impact - Testing moderators of the cultivation effect for estimates of crime risk

People may use information from a variety of sources in constructing their judgments of crime risk, including direct experience, word-of-mouth, and th e mass media. One hundred fifty-eight general population respondents provid ed 3 estimates of risk of violent crime: societal crime risk, personal crim e risk to themselves in their own neighborhood, and personal crime risk to themselves in New York City Respondents' level of television viewing was re lated to their estimates of societal crime risk and to their estimates of p ersonal crime risk in New York City (p < .05) but not to their estimates of personal crime risk in their own neighborhood (p < .05). This pattern of r esults was qualified by a significant interaction (p < .05): all 3 risk est imates were related to respondents' level of television viewing only for th ose with high direct experience with crime, results that are consistent wit h Gerbner's concept of resonance (Gerbner et al., 1980). The implications f or the concept of impersonal impact (Tyler, 1980) and Gerbner et al.'s conc epts of cultivation and mainstreaming are also discussed.