The deceptively simple question “What is news?” remains pertinent even as we ponder the future of journalism in the digital age. This article examines news values within mainstream journalism and considers the extent to which news values may be changing since earlier landmark studies were undertaken. Its starting point is Harcup and O’Neill’s widely-cited 2001 updating of Galtung and Ruge’s influential 1965 taxonomy of news values. Just as that study put Galtung and Ruge’s criteria to the test with an empirical content analysis of published news, this new study explores the extent to which Harcup and O’Neill’s revised list of news values remain relevant given the challenges (and opportunities) faced by journalism today, including the emergence of social media. A review of recent literature contextualises the findings of a fresh content analysis of news values within a range of UK media 15 years on from the last study. The article concludes by suggesting a revised and updated set of contemporary news values, whilst acknowledging that no taxonomy can ever explain everything.

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/1461670X.2016.1150193

What is news? News values revisited (again)

In a high-choice media environment, there are fears that individuals will select media and content that reinforce their existing beliefs and lead to segregation based on interest and/or partisanshi

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/1369118X.2018.1428656

The echo chamber is overstated: the moderating effect of political interest and diverse media

This study examines the impact of social media spaces on news consumption, based on an online survey of 1600 Canadians. News organizations are rushing into social media, viewing services like Facebook and Twitter as opportunities to market and distribute content. There has been limited research outside the United States into the effects of social media on news consumption. Our study found that social networks are becoming a significant source of news for Canadians. Two-fifths of social networking users said they receive news from people they follow on services like Facebook, while a fifth get news from news organizations and individual journalists they follow. Users said they valued social media because it helped them keep up with events and exposed them to a wider range of news and information. While social interaction has always affected the dissemination of news, our study contributes to research that suggests social media are becoming central to the way people experience news. Networked media technolo...

SHARE, LIKE, RECOMMEND: Decoding the social media news consumer

During the last decennia media environments and political communication systems have changed fundamentally. These changes have major ramifications for the political information environments and the extent to which they aid people in becoming informed citizens. Against this background, the purpose of this article is to review research on key changes and trends in political information environments and assess their democratic implications. We will focus on advanced postindustrial democracies and six concerns that are all closely linked to the dissemination and acquisition of political knowledge: (1) declining supply of political information, (2) declining quality of news, (3) increasing media concentration and declining diversity of news, (4) increasing fragmentation and polarization, (5) increasing relativism and (6) increasing inequality in political knowledge.

/pdf/political-communication-in-a-high-choice-media-environment-a-fa7g2xnfq4.pdf

Political communication in a high-choice media environment: a challenge for democracy?

Concerns about public misinformation in the United States—ranging from politics to science—are growing. Here, we provide an overview of how and why citizens become (and sometimes remain) misinformed about science. Our discussion focuses specifically on misinformation among individual citizens. However, it is impossible to understand individual information processing and acceptance without taking into account social networks, information ecologies, and other macro-level variables that provide important social context. Specifically, we show how being misinformed is a function of a person’s ability and motivation to spot falsehoods, but also of other group-level and societal factors that increase the chances of citizens to be exposed to correct(ive) information. We conclude by discussing a number of research areas—some of which echo themes of the 2017 National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine’s Communicating Science Effectively report—that will be particularly important for our future understanding of misinformation, specifically a systems approach to the problem of misinformation, the need for more systematic analyses of science communication in new media environments, and a (re)focusing on traditionally underserved audiences.

https://www.pnas.org/content/pnas/116/16/7662.full.pdf

Science audiences, misinformation, and fake news.

Reuters Institute digital news report 2014

The eighth Digital News Report from the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at the University of Oxford reveals that public concern about misinformation is making some people more careful about the brands they choose and the content they share online. The report, which is based on a YouGov survey conducted with 75,000 people in 38 markets, says that changing behaviour is most apparent with those that are younger and better educated, rather than older or less privileged groups. Across countries over a quarter (26%) say they are relying on more ‘reputable’ sources of news than this time last year – rising to 40% in the US. A further quarter (24%) said they had stopped using sources with a dubious reputation. The report also brings new comparative data on changing online business models, trust, misinformation, the rise of messaging apps and the impact of populism on media usage.

Reuters Institute digital news report 2019

This year's report reveals new insights about digital news consumption based on a YouGov survey of over 70,000 online news consumers in 36 countries including the US and UK. The report focuses on the issues of trust in the era of fake news, changing business models and the role of platforms. 
Some of the key findings from our 2017 research: 
Growth in social media for news is flattening out in some markets, as messaging apps that are (a) more private and (b) tend not to filter content algorithmically are becoming more popular. The use of WhatsApp for news is starting to rival Facebook in a number of markets including Malaysia (51%), Brazil (46%), and Spain (32%). 
Only a quarter (24%) of our respondents think social media do a good job in separating fact from fiction, compared to 40% for the news media. Our qualitative data suggest that users feel the combination of a lack of rules and viral algorithms are encouraging low quality and ‘fake news’ to spread quickly. 
There are wide variations in trust across our 36 countries. The proportion that says they trust the news is highest in Finland (62%), but lowest in Greece and South Korea (23%). In most countries, we find a strong connection between distrust in the media and perceived political bias. This is particularly true in countries with high levels of political polarisation like the United States, Italy, and Hungary. 
Almost a third of our sample (29%) say they often or sometimes avoid the news. For many, this is because it can have a negative effect on mood. For others, it is because they can’t rely on news to be true. 
Mobile marches on, outstripping computer access for news in an increasing number of countries. Mobile news notifications have grown significantly in the last year, especially in the US ( 8 percentage points), South Korea ( 7), and Australia ( 4), becoming an important new route to content and giving a new lease of life to news apps. 
In a related development there has been a significant growth in mobile news aggregators, notably Apple News, but also Snapchat Discover for younger audiences. Both have doubled usage with their target groups in the last year. 
Smartphones are now as important for news inside the home as outside. More smartphone users now access news in bed (46%) than use the device when commuting to work. 
Voice-activated digital assistants like the Amazon Echo are emerging as a new platform for news, already outstripping smart watches in the US, UK, and Germany. 
In terms of online news subscriptions, we have seen a very substantial ‘Trump bump’ in the US (from 9 to 16%) along with a tripling of news donations. Most of those new payments have come from the young – a powerful corrective to the idea that young people are not prepared to pay for online media, let alone news. 
Across all countries, only around one in ten (13%) pay for online news but some regions (Nordics) are doing much better than others (Southern Europe and much of Asia). 
Ad-blocking growth has stalled on desktop (21%) and remains low on smartphones (7%). Over half say they have temporarily disabled their ad-blocker for news in countries like Poland (57%), Denmark (57%), and the United States (52%). 
We have new evidence that news brands may be struggling to cut through on distributed platforms. In a study tracking more than 1,500 respondents in the UK, we found that while most could remember the path through which they found a news story (Facebook, Google, etc.), less than half could recall the name of the news brand itself when coming from search (37%) and social (47%). 
Austrians and Swiss are most wedded to printed newspapers, Germans and Italians love TV bulletins, while Latin Americans get more news via social media and chat apps than other parts of the world.

Reuters Institute digital news report 2017

User-generated picture or video scoops regularly lead television bulletins and the front pages of newspapers, whilst a new category of opinionated blogging is redefining the frontiers of journalism itself. This study explores how mainstream media organisations are responding to this wave of participatory and social media, linked with a historic shift in control towards individual consumers. The paper examines how journalists at leading news organisations in the UK and USA are increasingly involving audiences in the way they research and tell stories. It explores the dilemmas and issues raised by greater audience engagement through case-study interviews with leading practitioners and managers, as well as drawing on previously published interviews and research. It looks at how mainstream media coverage of breaking news events is changing, using topical cases studies from the G20 London summit and Iranian street protests.

The rise of social media and its impact on mainstream journalism

This year's report reveals new insights about digital news consumption based on a YouGov survey of over 20,000 online news consumers in the US, UK, Ireland, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Denmark, Finland, Brazil, Japan and Australia. This year's data shows a quickening of the pace towards social media platforms as routes to audiences, together with a surge in the use of mobile for news, a decline in the desktop internet and significant growth in video news consumption online.

Nic Newman

Papers

Reuters Institute digital news report 2014

Reuters Institute digital news report 2019

Reuters Institute digital news report 2017

The rise of social media and its impact on mainstream journalism

Reuters Institute Digital News Report 2015