Opinion Leaders
An opinion leader is a broker who imparts information about politics and government to other people. Opinion leaders are attentive to media messages and pass on information in a simplified format to people who pay less attention to politics. The two-step flow model of communication posits that the media disseminate information that is received by opinion leaders, who interpret the information and pass it on to opinion followers, who are less interested in and informed about political affairs. Opinion leaders have the respect of opinion followers because of their status in a social group, their role as a political expert, or their celebrity.