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In lifestyle politics, citizens take political action by adapting their everyday lives to address transnational challenges, such as climate change. An important driver of lifestyle politics is exposure to media--both mass media, serving as important information sources, and social media, enabling discussion and expression. To explore how elements of culture shape this relationship, this study examines (a) the link between media use (measured by mass media and social media use) and lifestyle politics across 28 European countries and (b) how cultural context factors (measured by national levels of postmaterialist orientation and trust) moderate this relationship. Results of a multilevel analysis support the positive link between mass media use and lifestyle politics across all countries. However, the results also suggest that the relationship between social media use and lifestyle politics is positive only in countries with postmaterialist orientations and high levels of trust, underscoring the importance of cultural context factors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Personalities in the media both influence and restrict topics of discussion and the amount of information available, thus exerting a substantial influence on the formation of the audience's political opinion. The present study examines this impact by integrating the theoretical concepts of parasocial relationship and opinion leadership. The resulting phenomenon, parasocial opinion leadership, is based on viewers' perceptions and emerges if (a) a media user ascribes certain attributes to a media communicator based on a parasocial relationship, which (b) allows for a gradual influence of the media personality on the user's opinions and attitudes by fulfilling at least one of three functions: information and reduction of complexity, orientation, or arousal of interest. A qualitative survey among TV users confirms the main assumptions of the concept. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]