The two-step flow theory is a communication model developed in the 1940s by Paul Lazarsfeld and Elihu Katz. It suggests that mass media doesn’t directly influence the public.
Instead, information first reaches opinion leaders, who are more engaged with media, and they interpret and pass it on to others in their social networks.
This highlights the role of social influence and interpersonal communication in shaping opinions.
Key Takeaways
- Origin: Developed by Paul Lazarsfeld and Elihu Katz in the 1940s, the theory challenged the idea that media messages directly shape public opinion.
- Process: Information flows first to opinion leaders who closely follow media, then spreads to others through interpersonal communication.
- Influence: Opinion leaders act as interpreters and filters, shaping how media messages are understood within their social groups.
- Application: The model helps explain how political campaigns, advertising, and today’s social media influencers affect public attitudes.
- Critique: While influential, the theory oversimplifies modern communication where audiences interact with media directly and across multiple channels.
Origins of the Theory
The two-step flow model was first introduced by Hazel Gaudet, Bernard Berelson, and Paul Lazarsfeld in their 1944 study The People’s Choice (published in 1948).
The book reported findings from their analysis of voting behavior during the 1940 U.S. presidential election.
They observed that mass media messages rarely influenced voters directly.
Instead, information was first absorbed by highly engaged media users – later termed opinion leaders -who interpreted and passed on this content to less active media consumers.
Most voters reported that their knowledge of the candidates came not directly from newspapers or radio, but from conversations with people who had already consumed and discussed that information.
From this, the authors concluded that while the direct impact of mass media is limited, interpersonal communication—particularly through opinion leaders – plays a vital role in shaping attitudes and decisions.
How does it work (media → opinion leaders → wider audience)
The two-step flow model explains that mass media messages don’t usually reach people directly in a powerful way.
Instead, information from newspapers, radio, TV, or today’s social media is first picked up by opinion leaders – individuals who pay close attention to news, trends, and campaigns.
These opinion leaders interpret the content, form their own views, and then share it with people around them through conversations, recommendations, or social influence.
In this way, information flows in two steps: from the media to opinion leaders, and from opinion leaders to the wider audience.
For example, during an election, many voters might not read detailed political coverage themselves but instead rely on a friend, community leader, or influencer who explains the key points.
This process highlights how personal interaction often has a stronger effect on people’s attitudes and decisions than mass media alone.
Opinion leaders vs. influencers – are they the same?
Opinion leaders and influencers share similarities, but they are not identical.
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Opinion leaders are individuals who naturally gain trust and authority within their social circles. They are often highly knowledgeable about a topic, follow media closely, and shape how others interpret information. For example, a teacher, community activist, or even a well-read friend could act as an opinion leader without being widely known.
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Influencers, in the modern sense, are people who build audiences on digital platforms like Instagram, YouTube, or TikTok and intentionally leverage their visibility to shape attitudes and behaviors. While many influencers function as opinion leaders, the relationship is more commercialized and can reach a much larger scale than the face-to-face networks described in the original two-step flow model.
In short: opinion leadership is a social role, while being an influencer is often a profession. Influencers are today’s digital-era version of opinion leaders, but not all opinion leaders are influencers.
Examples of the Model
The two-step flow model can be seen in many areas of everyday life:
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Politics: During election campaigns, most voters don’t read policy documents directly. Instead, they hear simplified interpretations from journalists, community leaders, or friends who follow the news more closely.
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Advertising: Brands often target influential figures – such as trendsetters or celebrities – knowing that their endorsement will shape the opinions and buying decisions of wider audiences.
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Social Media: Today’s influencers on platforms like Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube act as modern opinion leaders. They interpret content, share reviews, and guide how millions of followers think about products, fashion, or lifestyle choices.
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Health Communication: Public health campaigns often rely on trusted figures, such as doctors, teachers, or local leaders, to interpret and spread information in a way that communities will accept and act on.
Critical Evaluation
Strength: Highlights the role of social influence.
The two-step flow model is praised for recognizing that people are not passive recipients of media but are influenced by social interactions.
This matters because research during the 1940 U.S. election showed voters were more likely to be swayed by trusted opinion leaders than by direct media exposure.
By shifting focus from a “top-down” media effect to interpersonal communication, the model provided a more realistic view of how ideas spread.
This makes the theory useful for understanding phenomena such as political campaigning, advertising, and influencer marketing, where persuasion often happens through trusted intermediaries rather than through media messages alone.
Limitation: Oversimplifies communication flow.
Critics argue that the two-step flow model reduces the complexity of communication to just two stages: media → opinion leaders → general public.
In practice, information can pass through multiple steps, circles, and feedback loops, and people may access media directly without mediation.
This simplification overlooks the diversity of communication channels, especially in today’s digital environment.
Because of this, the model may underestimate the direct influence that media—particularly television and social media—can have on audiences, limiting its explanatory power in modern contexts.
Strength: Supported by empirical research.
The theory is grounded in detailed field studies, most notably The People’s Choice (1944) and Personal Influence (1955).
These studies systematically investigated how voting decisions were shaped and consistently found that interpersonal communication mediated media effects.
This empirical base distinguishes the model from more speculative theories like the hypodermic needle model.
The reliance on real-world data gives the theory credibility and helped establish communication research as an academic field, making it a cornerstone for later media-effect models.
Limitation: Context-dependent findings.
The original studies were conducted in the 1940s–1950s, in a media environment dominated by radio and newspapers.
The dominance of opinion leaders in filtering information may reflect that specific historical context.
In today’s media landscape, audiences have direct, instant access to diverse sources of information, from news apps to social feeds.
This raises doubts about how far the two-step flow theory can be generalized across time.
While still useful, it may not fully capture the complexity of 21st-century communication where information spreads simultaneously through mass media, peer networks, and algorithm-driven feeds.
Relevance: Anticipates modern influencer culture.
Despite its limitations, the theory remains highly relevant in explaining how information spreads on social media.
Influencers, bloggers, and online community leaders act as contemporary opinion leaders, interpreting and shaping messages for their followers.
This shows that while direct media effects exist, interpersonal influence still plays a central role.
The persistence of this pattern means the two-step flow model continues to inform strategies in politics, marketing, and public health, proving its value as a foundational communication theory even in the digital age.
Paradigm Shift in Mass Communication Theory
Before the two-step flow model, the dominant idea was the hypodermic needle theory (also called the “magic bullet” model).
That theory assumed media messages were like injections—directly entering people’s minds and producing an immediate, powerful effect on everyone in the same way.
The two-step flow model challenged this view.
Instead of audiences being passive recipients, it showed that people are influenced indirectly through opinion leaders who filter and interpret media content.
This means media effects are not uniform or automatic, but depend on social networks and conversations.
In short, the hypodermic needle model emphasizes direct impact, while the two-step flow model highlights the importance of human interaction in shaping opinions.
Further Information
- Weimann, G. (1982). On the importance of marginality: One more step into the two-step flow of communication. American Sociological Review, 764-773.
- Nisbet, M. C., & Kotcher, J. E. (2009). A two-step flow of influence? Opinion-leader campaigns on climate change. Science Communication, 30(3), 328-354.
- Katz, E. (1957). The two-step flow of communication: An up-to-date report on an hypothesis. Public opinion quarterly, 21(1), 61-78.
- Norris, P., & Curtice, J. (2008). Getting the message out: A two-step model of the role of the Internet in campaign communication flows during the 2005 British general election. Journal of Information Technology & Politics, 4(4), 3-13.
References
Carpenter, C. R. (2010). How does an “opinion leader” influence my practice? [Journal/Report title if available]. PMC article.
Deutschmann, P. J., & Danielson, W. A. (1960). Diffusion of knowledge of the major news story. Journalism Quarterly, 37(3), 345–355.
Herrero, E. (2025). The Women Who Proposed Two-Step Flow: A Gendered Revisit to the Intellectual History of a Mass Communication Theory. International Journal of Communication, 19, 417–436.
Hilbert, M., Vásquez, J., Halpern, D., Valenzuela, S., & Arriagada, E. (2017). One step, two step, network step? Complementary perspectives on communication flows in Twittered citizen protests. Social Science Computer Review, 35(4), 444–461. https://doi.org/10.1177/0894439316639561
Katz, E., & Lazarsfeld, P. F. (1955). Personal influence: The part played by people in the flow of mass communications. Free Press.
Katz, E. (1957). The Two-Step Flow of Communication: An Up-To-Date Report on an Hypothesis. Public Opinion Quarterly.
Lazarsfeld, P. F., Berelson, B., & Gaudet, H. (1944). The people’s choice: How the voter makes up his mind in a presidential campaign. Duell, Sloan & Pearce.
Lionberger, H. F. (1960). Adoption of new ideas and practices: A summary of the research dealing with the acceptance of technological change in agriculture, with implications for action in facilitating such change. Iowa State University Press.
Nisbet, M. (2018). Ambassadors for science: Harnessing the power of opinion-leaders across communities. Skeptical Inquirer, 42(2), 30–31.
Rogers, E. M. (1962). Diffusion of innovations. Free Press of Glencoe.
Schäfer, M. S., & Taddicken, M. (2015). Opinion Leadership Revisited: A Classical Concept in a Changing Media Environment. International Journal of Communication, 9, 956–959.
Troldahl, V. C. (1966). A field test of a modified “two-step flow of communication” model. Public Opinion Quarterly, 30(4), 609–623.
