Washington -- Mass media coverage of the U.S. presidential election involves two key elements -- news reporting and paid advertising. Together they make the media an important -- and influential -- factor in the election process.

The media -- newspapers, periodicals, television and radio -- depend upon the campaigns for both news and revenue. The candidates, in turn, depend upon the media to reach the largest possible number of voters.

Most Americans get their information about politics and issues from the media, and television is the dominant force. Campaign events are covered on the nightly news; the candidates appear not only on news interview programs but also daytime talk shows; extensive time is devoted on the air to debates and party conventions. And that is just at the national level.

At the state and local level, when a candidate makes a campaign stop, he provides time for exclusive interviews with area journalists. Candidates have realized over the years that the national media, always on the lookout for a big story, often tend to focus on the controversial aspects of a campaign, while local coverage is frequently more positive.

The media "tend to accentuate the negative," says political analyst Norman Ornstein of the American Enterprise Institute, "to hit hardest at those who are in power or running ahead, and to emphasize scandal."

Candidates attempt to counter this, and use the media to their advantage, by carefully staging media events at such photogenic locations as flag factories or national monuments, with balloons and banners in the background, and delivering "sound bites" -- brief phrases that are carefully worded to make an impact on the news program.

There was a dramatic rise of daytime television talk shows as a political venue in 1992, primarily due to the willingness of the candidates to accept invitations from program hosts to be interviewed. Independent candidate Ross Perot started the phenomenon in February of that year, when, during an appearance on the Larry King call-in show on CNN, he spelled out the circumstances under which he would consider running for the presidency.

Such shows are vehicles for television viewers, radio listeners and members of a studio audience to see more of the candidates than network sound bites allow; and, by speaking directly to them, the voters have an opportunity to express their own views.

The presidential debates are perhaps the most important media events covered in the campaign because voters can see how candidates react in a stressful situation and can read numerous articles analyzing the debates after they occur.

Newspapers generally give more extensive coverage to the campaign than does television, however, because they do not operate under the same time and cost constraints as television. It is also possible for newspapers to offer greater depth of coverage because they are able to provide a larger number of reporters to cover a campaign.

New computer technology gives newspapers the benefit, too, of what political analyst Stephen Hess of the Brookings Institution calls "corrective journalism." Instead of printing a candidate's statement one day, an opposition rebuttal the next and a related opinion piece on the third day, Hess points out, the technology, by allowing immediate access to information, now gives journalists the capability to include charges, countercharges, background research and analysis all in the same article.

Hess points out, however, that even though this journalistic change will make candidates more rigorous in their statements and help inform the electorate, for now it has led to increased charges of media bias and growing voter cynicism.

In a survey of more than 1,600 election stories featured in early 1992 on television network evening news programs, the Center for Media and Public Affairs, a bipartisan research organization in Washington, found that policy positions of the candidates received the most attention of any aspect of the campaign and were spotlighted in more than one third of all the reports. This was nearly twice as often as in the 1988 presidential campaign.

In contrast, the Center said, the single most heavily covered topic during 1988 was the so-called "horse race," the standings and prospects of the candidates. This ranked fourth in 1992.

Two other aspects of the campaign -- strategy and such controversies as scandals and gaffes -- received about the same level of attention in 1992 as they did in 1988, the Center added.

It also said that during the 1992 primary season, both President Bush and Democratic candidate Bill Clinton received more negative coverage than their opponents on TV news programs. However, the Center pointed out, since the end of the primary season in June 1992, evaluations of the president on the news were more negative than positive by a three-to-two margin while those of Clinton were more evenly balanced. As a result, the Center said, the tone of TV news election coverage 1992 favored the Democrats over the Republicans.

Another research organization, the New York City based Freedom Forum Media Studies Center, assessing the print media's coverage of the 1992 presidential race, said a major criticism that year was the emphasis placed on the "character issue."

Allegations of infidelity, drug use and draft-dodging directed toward Clinton had called into question what was appropriate material for use by the media in evaluating a candidate. But a cross section of political journalists interviewed by the Freedom Forum center said the focus on character provides voters with a measure of a candidate's capacity for integrity and leadership.

In the area of advertising, millions of the dollars that candidates raise in their campaigns are spent on print and broadcast spots, especially on television.

Negative ads tend to turn off many viewers, but, says Drexel University political science professor William Rosenberg, "negative ads aren't by definition uninformative. They can contain some information about an opposing candidate that is reasonable to communicate in a campaign."

And that is what the media are trying to do in the presidential election campaign, both through reporting and paid advertising -- communicate reasonable information. [In 1996, the conventional wisdom is that negative ads work, even though it may turn off voters to the political process.]