Temple University Creates Media Index Leveraging LexisNexis News and Business Content to Score Candidates’ Performance in Campaigns

PHILADELPHIA--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Temple University’s Fox School of Business and LexisNexis® Legal & Professional, a leading global provider of content and technology solutions, today announced an alliance to support Temple’s newly released media index to track and score the presidential, Senate, House and gubernatorial campaigns across social, broadcast and print media.

“We are very excited about our collaboration with LexisNexis and the opportunity to leverage their comprehensive database of news and business sources”

The index, called TEMPO, for Translating the Effectiveness of Media into Performance, analyzes media-related data for more than 900 candidates nationwide by using customized software and direct access to the extensive content resources of LexisNexis. The TEMPO index represents one of the first and most comprehensive studies of different types of media, their effects on one another – and how they ultimately influence campaigns.

“We are very excited about our collaboration with LexisNexis and the opportunity to leverage their comprehensive database of news and business sources,” said Munir Mandviwalla, executive director of the Temple-based Institute for Business and Information Technology (IBIT).

“LexisNexis is delighted to be working with Temple University on this project,” said Thomas Ogburn, LexisNexis vice president and managing director for Business Insight Solutions. “The TEMPO index will be a credible tool for evaluating the link between media and this year’s campaign results. What makes this powerful is the combination of LexisNexis news and business information and Temple’s social content and analytic expertise. It’s also a superb example of how to turn big data into valuable insights.”

Each candidate’s TEMPO score is drawn from tens of thousands of data points derived from blogs, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, web analytics from Alexa and print and broadcast media mentions compiled by LexisNexis, as well as campaign websites. The data is based on a set of software agents that analyze social media, as well as specialized queries into the vast LexisNexis database, which includes more than 20,000 news sources.

“While polls are useful measures of voters’ intentions, activity on social media is a reflection of what voters are actually doing,” said David Schuff, a Fox School of Business professor. “Activity in print and broadcast media is also a critical measure of voter exposure. By looking at them together, the TEMPO index can highlight the underlying dynamics of a race.”

Added Mandviwalla: “The Temple Fox School TEMPO index provides, for the first time, a completely different tool to gauge media performance that is based on the actual activity and reactions of very large numbers of people.”

Starting today, TEMPO index results will be updated at least weekly on mediaindex.temple.edu and periodically supplemented with deeper analysis. Researchers have collected data on the presidential campaign since Jan. 1, 2012, the Senate and gubernatorial campaigns since July 19 and the House campaigns since Aug. 29.

In addition to regularly updating the TEMPO index for the presidential race until Election Day, researchers plan to draw conclusions on the relative influence of social and mainstream media on each other, as well as their combined effects on donations, poll results and election wins or losses.

“This project is a forerunner of our 'media ecosystem model' that provides the tools to explore influences of social media, print and broadcast media and campaign outcomes,” said Fox School of Business professor Sunil Wattal. “With this study, we will be able to, for the first time, make conclusions about the relationships between different forms of media and campaign outcomes.”

Current results and races to watch include:

Presidential campaign

As of Sept. 28, Barack Obama’s total TEMPO stood at 1,198, down 318 points from the prior week. During the same time period, Obama’s social TEMPO increased 76 points to 1,427 while his print and broadcast TEMPO dropped from 1,527 to 788.

Still, Obama’s total TEMPO surpasses that of Mitt Romney’s 824. Romney’s social score (953, up 3 points) and print and broadcast score (592, down 560 points) both fall below Obama.

Other notable races and TEMPO scores

In Pennsylvania’s Senate race, Republican Tom Smith holds a slight lead (TEMPO score of 58-55) over incumbent Democrat Bob Casey. In New Jersey, incumbent Democratic Sen. Robert Menendez leads challenger Joseph Kyrillos’s TEMPO score by four points, 60-56.

In Massachusetts, Democratic Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren’s TEMPO leads incumbent Sen. Scott Brown, 98-83, and in the Missouri Senate race, Republican challenger Todd Akin’s TEMPO score of 94 is seven points higher than Sen. Claire McCaskill’s. In those tighter Senate races, the candidates’ TEMPO scores are generally more volatile, reflected in their one-week change.

Because TEMPO leverages a diverse and large data set that is continuously growing, each TEMPO score has no upper limit. The large gaps in scores between the presidential race and other campaigns are due to the heightened visibility of Obama and Romney.

TEMPO Scores for Notable Races

	Polls*	TEMPO**	TEMPO^P&B	TEMPO^SOC
Presidential
Barack Obama	48.5%	1198 (-318)	788 (-739)	1427 (+76)
Mitt Romney	44.3%	824 (-197)	592 (-560)	953 (+3)
PA Senate
Bob Casey Jr.	46.1%	55 (0)	80 (0)	40 (0)
Tom Smith	40.1%	58 (-5)	90 (+1)	41 (-5)
NJ Senate
Bob Menendez	48.2%	60 (+3)	83 (+1)	45 (+3)
Joe Kryillos	34%	56 (-1)	81 (+1)	39 (-3)
MA Senate
Elizabeth Warren	48.6%	98 (+5)	99 (-58)	56 (-1)
Scott Brown	46.2%	83 (-9)	113 (-49)	65 (+7)
MO Senate
Claire McCaskill	47.5%	87 (+19)	131 (+28)	64 (+19)
Todd Akin	46.5%	94 (+13)	146 (+33)	64 (+2)
* Latest available polling data as of 9/28/2012 ** TEMPO data as of 9/28/2012. 1-week change in parentheses. P&B = Print & Broadcast SOC = Social Media

Disclaimer: The information presented here is the result of the application of mathematical formulas to data, and is not an endorsement or suggestion of support for any particular candidate or campaign.

About Temple University’s Fox School of Business

Established in 1918, the Fox School of Business at Temple University is the largest, most comprehensive business school in the Greater Philadelphia region – and among the largest in the world – with 6,500 students, 175 full-time faculty and more than 59,000 alumni. Accredited by AACSB International, the Fox School offers BBA, MBA, Executive MBA, Online MBA, MS and PhD programs on campuses throughout the world. Fox’s innovative, entrepreneurial programs continue to be ranked nationally and internationally by leading business publications and organizations. Discover the Power of Fox. www.fox.temple.edu.

About LexisNexis Legal & Professional

LexisNexis® Legal & Professional (www.lexisnexis.com) is a leading global provider of content and technology solutions that enable professionals in legal, corporate, tax, government, academic and non-profit organizations to make informed decisions and achieve better business outcomes. As a digital pioneer, the company was the first to bring legal and business information online with its Lexis® and Nexis® services. Today, LexisNexis Legal & Professional harnesses leading-edge technology and world-class content, to help professionals work in faster, easier and more effective ways. Through close collaboration with its customers, the company ensures organizations can leverage its solutions to reduce risk, improve productivity, increase profitability and grow their business. Part of Reed Elsevier, LexisNexis Legal & Professional serves customers in more than 100 countries with 10,000 employees worldwide.

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