Who Are The Talkers?

Fox moderators out-talk CNN moderators

By Dylan Byers | 2/24/12 -- 9:54 AM EST




A new survey from the University of Minnesota's Humphey School of Public Affairs finds that CNN's Republican debate moderators took a "relatively laissez-faire approach" in their handling of the conversation, spending less time speaking than the moderators on any other network.

In the six CNN debates since September, the moderators -- Wolf Blitzer, John King, and Anderson Cooper -- spoke for an average 15.9 percent of the broadcast, according to the school's Smart Politics study.

Fox News moderators spoke the most. In the three Fox News debates conducted in that time period, moderators spoke for 26.2 percent of the time.

"Overall, CNN debates saw candidates speak at a ratio of 5.12 minutes for every 1 minute of moderator speaking time," the authors write. "At FOX candidates were allowed to speak for just 2.76 minutes for every 1 minute given to the moderators."

"That translates into FOX moderators filling air time with an additional six minutes and 11 seconds of every hour of debate vis-à-vis those conducted by CNN."

The full study is available here.