“Each arena, it seems, has a corps of leaders of its own.”

And we might be those leaders, say Elihu Katz and Paul Lazarsfeld in their 1955 book “Personal Influence: The Part Played by People in the Flow of Mass Communications.”

I took a PhD class called Media and Politics in America. I like both topics, and also liked that one of the assigned readings dipped into another fave topic: interpersonal relationships. We read the Katz and Lazarsfeld study, which is famous among scholars who study politics and media. It focuses on interpersonal relationships and the potential influence those relationships have on fashion, public affairs, movie attendance, and the purchasing of household products.

Their research showed most people aren’t directly impacted by messages like advertisements. Instead, they’re influenced by a two-step process in which people thought to be leaders with valid opinions and judgement receive messages from the media. They in turn analyze and share with others in their personal networks.
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