The goal of this graduate student and faculty collaborative is to integrate scholarship from communications, political science, psychology and sociology to investigate the effects of mass media on political judgment and reasoning. This working group has a long history in the school, where it has been a center of research activity focusing on media and politics for over 35 years. Most recently, we have focused on message framing and priming effects, using online survey experiments to engage in dynamic testing of potential influences. We approach this work from a multiplicity of perspectives, examining the possible consequences of message framing and priming effects for political sophistication and learning, reason giving and deliberative discussion, social tolerance and trust, and expressive participation.