• media theory
• suggests that people who believe they hold a minority viewpoint on a public issue will remain in the background 
• those who believe they have a majority view will be more encouraged to speak
• media will focus on majority views, leading those in a minority to be even less assertive

• Noelle Neumann in the 1970s
• public
• legal association  ex:  public land/places
• concerns for people  ex:  public health issues, public responsibility of journalists
• social-psychological side of people  ex:  the public eye
• opinion:  an expression of an attitude
• varies in intensity and stability
• indicates a level of agreement of a particular population, something regarded as acceptable

• those attitudes that one can express without running the danger of isolating oneself
• things you can say without worry/concern

fear of isolation causes individuals to try to assess the climate of opinion at all times

• receive info about public opinion from personal observation and the media
• quasi-statistical sense:  personal estimation of the strength of opposing sides on a public issue
• pluristic ignorance:  personal observation can often be distorted and inaccurate

public behavior is affected by public opinion assessment

• public behavior = speaking out OR keeping silent
• humans have an aversion to discussing topics that don't have the support or the majority of people

• people often alter opinions to the media's influence
• the media provides phrases so people can speak confidently about a subject
• the public is given a limited view of reality

• ubiquitous:  media are pervasive sources of info
• cumulative:  the process of the media repeating themselves across programs and time
• consonance:  the similarities of beliefs, attitudes, and values held by the media

• people experience the climate of public opinion through mass media
• difference between the population's perception of a public issue and the way the media reports the issue
• despite the possibility of a dual climate opinion, many choose to remain silent

• an assessment of the extent to which people will speak in favor of their opinion
• last minute swings-jumping on the bandwagon of popular opinion during the final moments of conversation

the groups at the end of the spiral willing to speak out at any cost

• if the majority opinion becomes large enough, the majority voices becomes less powerful because no alternatives exist

weaknesses:  logical consistency

1. fails to acknowledge ego involvement in an issue
2. avoids the issue of selectivity
3. little empirical support for the claim that people will only speak out because they perceive support for their views (testability)
4. Noelle Neumann failed to test the assumption that feat of isolation keeps people from speaking out
5. focuses too much on media, especially German, which many not apply in the U.S.

strengths

1. one of the few theories to focuses on public opinion
2. heuristic