The book is a fundamental monograph by one of the most prominent American political scientists of the last 20-30 years, John Zaller. The main goal of this work is to build a model for the formation and change of public opinion as a result of the shifts observed in the media and discussions of political elites. The central mediating variable of the model is political awareness, which thus turns out to be not only the end result of the influence of the mass media, but also the influencing factor.