Investigating the Effects of Different Media Consumption Patterns on Inequality Perceptions: The Role of Mainstream Media, Social Media and TV Docusoap Watching in Enhancing Different Inequality Perceptions

This paper aims to contribute to a better understanding of the role played by different media consumption patterns in shaping beliefs about and evaluations and perceptions of income and wealth inequality in three European welfare states. Drawing on data from three representative population surveys conducted in 2024 and 2025 in France, Great Britain and Sweden, we will scrutinize, in particular, whether and to what extent consumption of mainstream media, such as newspapers, TV or radio, of social media, or of TV docusoaps containing latent beliefs about economic inequality (e.g., real-life stories or fictional dramas on inequality) is consequential. As for the relevance of TV docusoaps or entertainment programmes, for example, such as 'America's Got Talent', recent empirical studies suggest that perceptions and evaluations of economic inequality are, in part, shaped by their transmitted representations, too. Apart from disentangling the interrelationships between different media consumption patterns and economic inequality perceptions, this paper aims to elucidate whether income and wealth inequality perceptions are affected differently by different media consumption patterns. Preliminary cross-country analyses suggest that media consumption patterns, particularly in terms of TV docusoap consumption, depict some striking similarities and are, indeed, affecting viewers' assessments of economic inequality. These findings also hold after controlling for ideological orientations, party affiliations and socioeconomic covariates, suggesting the importance of 'lightweight' media content consumption for politically consequential opinion formation.