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Voters Still Disinterested Despite Media Hyping

Despite the dramatic increase in the quantity and prominence of the media's political coverage in recent weeks, voter apathy and disinterest remains unaffected, according to a report released by the Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy.

Part of the Vanishing Voter Project,

the report is a weekly nationwide telephone survey of about 1,000 adults.

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The latest results, from the week of Jan. 5-9, saw a doubling from the previous week of the number of Americans who could recall having recently seen, read or heard a campaign news story.

The proportion of people who said they had thought about the campaign sometime "during the past day" also more than tripled, from 11 percent to 34 percent.

Still, while those surveyed said they had received increased exposure to the presidential races, nearly 70 percent said they continued to view the campaign as "boring," and only 9 percent of those polled felt it had been "exciting."

Nearly 50 percent said they viewed the past week's campaign activities as "uninformative."

"These numbers reflect the ability of the media to get the voters' attention," said Thomas E. Patterson, coordinator of the Shorenstein Center poll and Bradlee professor of government and the press at the Kennedy School of Government.

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