We review the theoretical literature on market determinants of media bias. We present a theoretical framework that organizes many key themes in the literature, and discuss substantive lessons.

This article shows that the first autocorrelation of basketball shot results is a highly biased and inconsistent estimator of the first autocorrelation of the <italic>ex ante</italic> probabilities with which the shots are made. Shot result autocorrelation is close to zero even when shot probability...

We analyze a game theoretic model of social learning about a consumption good with endogenous timing and heterogeneous accuracy of private information. We show that if individuals value their reputation for the degree to which they are informed, this reduces the incentive to learn by observing...

The recent nonexperimental literature on social learning focuses on showing that observational learning exists, that is, individuals do indeed draw inferences by observing the actions of others. We take this literature a step further by analyzing whether individuals are Bayesian social learners....

I develop a model of the market for news in which consumers and reporters both ideologically misinterpret information and have biased beliefs about the extent to which others misinterpret information. I show that for some parameter values, in equilibrium: (i) a monopolist media outlet hires a...

I develop a model of the relation between the media environment and political obstructionism. I show that when voters are less informed by media, obstructionism becomes a more effective political signal for the minority party. The model thus implies that media change can cause gridlock via...

We used data on 20,000 ever-married adults in the General Social Survey to examine the relationship between watching pornographic films and various measures of marital well-being. We found that adults who had watched an X-rated movie in the past year were more likely to be divorced, more likely...

We examine how use of antidepressant medications is influenced by Food and Drug Administration (FDA) warnings about the increased risk of suicidality associated with pediatric antidepressant use. With individual-level data on antidepressant use from the Medical Expenditure Panel Survey, we...