By Yvonne T. Chua, University of the Philippines

Journalists and publications in the Philippines which have challenged populist president Rodrigo Duterte have faced increased attacks over the last year, ranging from insults to state-initiated court cases. Perhaps as a result, trust in the media is amongst the lowest of all the countries in this year’s survey.

Since his election in 2016, Duterte has vilified journalists, vowing to get back at those he felt had wronged him during the election and those who have been critical of his policies, especially his brutal war on drugs.

To date, ABS-CBN – the country’s leading radio and television network – has suffered the biggest blow. In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, its 42 television stations, 10 digital broadcast channels and 23 radio channels stopped broadcasting on May 5, 2020, a day after its 25-year legislative franchise to operate expired (and around 3 months after the Digital News Report survey was conducted). The 66-year-old network’s roller-coaster ride began when Duterte repeatedly threatened to close it for failing to run his political ads in 2016. Packed with Duterte allies, the House of Representatives of the bicameral Philippine Congress had sat on ABS-CBN’s application for franchise renewal since 2014. In February, the solicitor-general asked the Supreme Court to revoke the network’s franchise for supposed violations of the terms of its license, an allegation it denies. As of end-May, the network’s presence remains limited to cable television and digital platforms unaffected by the expiration of its franchise. It is contesting its closure before the Supreme Court.

Like ABS-CBN, multi-award-winning journalist Maria Ressa and her news site Rappler – a digital-born operation which focuses on in-depth reports – have become the symbol of what it is to be the object of Duterte’s wrath. As well as being banned from presidential events, Rappler, Ressa and her colleagues face seven court cases, including revocation of operating licence, claims of tax fraud and cyberdefamation. A Manila court on June 15 convicted Ressa and a former colleague of cyber libel, sentencing them to between six months and six years in prison and ordering them to pay $8,000 in damages.

The government has also gone after independent media. In April 2019 it released a “matrix” that linked news site Vera Files, Rappler and the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism in a plot to oust Duterte. It later transpired that the accusations had no link to the named organisations, none of which was implicated.¹

Journalists have been labelled “prostitutes,” “fake news,” “spies,” “lowlifes” and “enemy” by the president and his supporters who have sown confusion between foreign funding of mass media, which is lawful, and foreign ownership, which is prohibited. Alternative media outlets have been plagued by distributed denial of service attacks and “red-tagging” – being labelled as communists or terrorists. There have also been physical attacks. In May 2020, an alliance of media organisations recorded at least 171 incidents of attacks and threats against the media since Duterte became president, including the deaths of 15 journalists. The Philippines has become notorious for impunity.

As a response to the years of attacks that journalists have faced, in November 2019, a coalition of media stakeholders set up the Philippine Plan of Action on the Safety of Journalists – a five-point programme which includes protocols for working conditions, legal advocacy and public education. Coincidentally, in December, 28 people – including members of a well-entrenched political clan – were convicted for the 2009 murder of 32 journalists, the world’s worst single incident of killing of journalists.

Duterte’s assault on the media and his critics has not dented his popularity, however. Public trust in his office remains high in the eighties, according to the 2019 Philippine Trust Index survey², perhaps as a result of his populist policies. This year’s Digital News Project found overall trust in news in the Philippines at a low 27%. Trust in the most battered outlets has suffered, while those which have escaped the presidential wrath have performed better. ABS-CBN scored 63% in the survey, 12 points lower than its rival, GMA Network, which has a reputation for cautious decision-making, and tied with state-owned PTV. Rappler has a score of 49%, below not only PTV but also the government’s Radyo Pilipinas.

Traditional TV still dominates the media landscape though with our urban sample internet reach has been growing rapidly. Legacy media have long gone digital, yielding positive results for many. This year’s report shows 85% of respondents going online for news, the majority through smartphones. ABS-CBN and GMA and the leading daily Philippine Daily Inquirer are the most visited news sites, in line with other industry data. Their social media accounts command a sizeable following in a country where people spend nearly 10 hours a day on the internet, nearly four hours of which on social media, the longest amount in the world.³ Filipinos have however shown themselves reluctant to pay for news. Digital content has so far remained mostly free.

Taken together, ABS-CBN and GMA had accounted for 80% of audience share, reach and advertising revenue, making them a duopoly. In late March, as the country entered its second week of lockdown because of the coronavirus lockdown, television viewership leapt 23 percent — an additional three million viewers — as people tuned in to their television, mostly for news. When ABS-CBN closed in early May, GMA’s share of viewers jumped overnight from 40% to 60%. The Philippine Competition Commission earlier warned this would mean a less competitive media environment.

Elections are held every three years, and always boost the profits of media organisations. Political adverts in the 2019 midterm elections helped ABS-CBN and GMA net income to soar to more than $40 million each for the first nine months of 2019. Senatorial candidates alone spent $75 million in campaign ads from February to April, channelled mostly to TV and radio. However, changes in campaign spending are in store for the 2022 presidential elections. Nearly all candidates across every election have fully integrated digital operations, including social media campaigning, in the 2019 elections. Many of them had used disinformation to sow distrust of rival candidates and the media.

How the lockdown arising from COVID-19 will hit media earnings remains to be seen. Advertising investments in TV alone dropped 40% when the lockdown started. News organisations suspended operations, shortened hours, showed repeats, reduced print runs or adopted remote working. Government media became a primary source of information. What seems certain is the pandemic has aggravated the crisis facing the media in the Philippines, which has fallen two notches in the 2020 World Press Freedom Index. Along with other laws, a law granting Duterte ad hoc emergency powers to handle the outbreak has been used to file criminal charges against two local journalists and threaten campus journalists for purportedly spreading false information during the lockdown. The journalists face two years’ imprisonment and a $2,000 fine.

The media have embraced further innovations. Another all-news TV channel was launched in 2018 on satellite provider Cignal. One News brings together the news division units all within the Medi-aQuest group: TV5, The Philippine Star and BusinessWorld. Its online platform started operations in July 2019.

Through YouTube’s Innovation Grant, ABS-CBN and GMA rolled out new programmes on YouTube for the digital generation. ABS-CBN’s “NXT” offers explainers on current events. GMA’s “Stand for Truth,” a daily newscast, focuses on data-driven reports. NXT is produced by ABS-CBN News Digital, which is also behind “ABS-CBN Digital Specials,” a collection of long-form multimedia stories. The network also launched in 2019 ABS-CBN TVplus Go, its new digital TV dongle for Android smartphones.

Text-to-audio services are prominent on the GMA and the Inquirer websites, in keeping with the growing online listenership. And as more Filipinos listen to podcasts – 57% each month in this year’s report – a startup formed by a group of journalists has launched the country’s first podcast network, PumaPodcast.

Note: Data are from more urban areas, rather than a fully nationally representative sample. These will tend to represent richer and more connected users.

Top Brands

Changing Media

Traditional TV still dominates the news media landscape, but amongst our urban sample online, news websites and social media are more widely used. Only a very small percentage read broadsheet newspapers. Filipinos are highest users of Facebook (73%) for reading, discussing, and sharing news in our survey. They also love to use smartphones to access news (75%).

Trust

Journalists have faced regular verbal attacks by President Duterte and his supporters in his battle with media critics. Trust in ABS-CBN, which was subsequently subject to a government shutdown order, scored 61% in the survey, 12 points lower than the GMA Network, which has a reputation for more cautious decision-making. Rappler, which is fighting multiple court cases, has a score of 49%.

But the past year seems to have marked a shift in terms of public and political interest, with more people across the globe, particularly the young, joining demonstrations and strikes led by next generation leaders like Greta Thunberg. Much of this support in turn has been mobilised not by traditional sources like television but through networked channels such as Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram. This generational pressure has combined with a series of real-life events which have included a record melting of the ice sheets, crop failures in the Mid-West, floods in Europe, and devastating fires in both the Amazon and Australia – all of which have raised climate issues higher up the media agenda. Some news organisations have also devoted more resource and editorial priority to the issue and there have been joint initiatives including Covering Climate Now which involves 400 media outlets.

In this chapter we explore in detail the different sources people use to learn more about climate change and how this is affected by age, education, and political affiliation. We also look at the extent to which different groups value the media’s coverage of this complex subject and ask how it could be improved. Our analysis covers 40 markets, from Sweden to Kenya to the Philippines.

The Majority are Concerned about Climate Change

Climate change really matters to most people. On average, across all markets, around 69% of respondents stated that they consider climate change to be an extremely or very serious problem. Less than one in ten (9%) of our respondents does not see climate change as serious while around one in five (19%) said they were somewhat concerned. There is some variation across countries. Around 90% of respondents in Chile, Kenya, and South Africa view climate change as very or extremely serious. Chile and some countries in Africa have historically shown high levels of concern², and the high figure for Chile could also have been related to its first internal population displacements last year as a result of a ten-year drought.³ In Africa too, many countries are already severely affected by the consequences of climate change.⁴ However, in Sweden, Norway, and the Netherlands, only around half (or less) think that climate change is a severe problem.

In most countries we observe a clear consensus about the seriousness on the issue on one side, but also a small number of individuals who do not take climate change seriously at all. This may be because they feel disconnected from the issue, because they are sceptical of the science, or because they are worried about the economic impact of measures to tackle climate change.

The vast majority of markets in our dataset have fewer than 3% saying climate change is not serious at all. But scepticism (or indifference) is far higher in the United States (12%) as well as in Sweden (9%), Greta Thunberg’s home country. Further, in Australia, 8% of respondents say that climate change is not serious at all, even though the country was going through devastating bush fires at the time of our fieldwork.

Volunteers and Fire Rescue officers fight a bushfire encroaching on properties in New South Wales December, 3, 2019 [AAP image/Dean Lewins]

Ideological Differences in the Perception of Climate Change

Political alignment may help explain some of the differences. Across markets, the more left one sits on the political spectrum, the more the levels of concern about climate change tend to rise. But in markets where the issue itself is highly politicised, the differences are even starker. In the United States, for instance, 89% of those who self-identify on the left report a serious concern about climate change, compared with just 18% of those who self-identify on the right. Right-wing media outlets in the United States have often taken a sceptical view of the scientific consensus while President Trump has announced plans to withdraw from the international Paris agreement because he thinks the restrictions will undermine the US economy. We find a similar divide in Sweden where right-wing websites play a significant role in opposing the consensus on a range of issues including climate change.

Sources of News on Climate Change

Our data show that people pay far more attention to television when it comes to climate change than to other forms of media. These findings are in line with previous research (Schäfer and Schlichting 2014), perhaps reflecting the power of the moving image to stir our emotions. Watching glaciers melt or seeing images of plastic clogging up our oceans can often have more impact than reading a news article containing scientific details of climate change.

Online news sites of major news organisations are the second most popular news source across all markets. Our survey respondents also pay attention to specialised outlets covering climate issues (13%) as well as alternative sources such as social media and blogs (9%). By comparison it is striking that printed newspapers and radio are even less important as a source of news than conversations with friends and family. On average, 7% of respondents across all markets stated that they do not pay attention to climate change news.

How Young People Access News about Climate Change

While television is more prevalent among respondents over the age of 35, alternative sources such as social media and blogs are more popular among younger groups. 18–24s (so-called Generation Z) are three times as likely to access alternative sources of news around climate change when compared to over-55s.

In open comments our respondents told us more about their motivations for using social media. Many talked about the value they got from accessing news directly from activists. Others said they picked up news by following celebrities or influencers that they admired:

I follow climate activists like Greta Thunberg [on social media] and follow what she does.

Female, 19, UK

Leonardo DiCaprio posts on Instagram about climate change a lot – so does Cody Simpson.

Female, 20, US

Others still talked about using a wide range of different sources in combination with mainstream media. This is in line with evidence noted in our Executive Summary that young people are more interested in news with a point of view and in accessing authentic and diverse perspectives from a wide range of digital sources including podcasts and blogs.

I get most of my news about climate change from smaller, independent news outlets such as commondreams.org as well as from various peoples’ feeds, pages, and websites that post interesting, and scientific, and political content.

Male, 25–34, US

[I am] following politicians, activists, and leaders in the world posting about climate change and how the things we do affect our environment. The Earth is our past, present, and future and [I] think that climate change should be the number one priority in everyone’s life.

Female, 25–34, US

It is important to stress that, as well as following activists and influencers, younger groups are also accessing traditional brands in social media. Titles like National Geographic, for example, seem to be finding a new audience with its visual Instagram and Facebook posts on the subject.

Sources of News Amongst the Least Concerned

Around a third (32%) of those who report that climate change is not serious or not serious at all state that they do not pay attention to news about climate change. Many of these tend to have lower levels of education and are less interested in news more generally.

Those who do pay attention but are still sceptical are less likely to use mainstream media but just as likely to use alternative sources such as social media when compared with those that are more concerned. Only a fifth (20%) of those who say that climate change is not serious rely on television news compared with 37% of those that take it more seriously.

Participation and Climate Change

Those that are less concerned, while fewer in numbers, frequently report sharing news stories online – especially in polarised societies. For example, in the USA, those who say that climate change is not serious are as likely to share news about climate change via social media or email as those who are extremely concerned about climate change. And in Sweden, the least concerned are almost twice as likely to share news online as those who believe that climate change is a serious issue. In both these countries we see a highly vocal minority making a big noise online.

By contrast, in Chile, where we record the highest degree of concern over climate change, most of the online sharing comes from those with the highest levels of concern and this is the picture we find in most other countries.

How Do the News Media Perform?

With an overall consensus about the seriousness of climate change, how do people feel the media are doing in covering the issue and informing the public? Across markets around half (47%) say that the news media do a good job in providing accurate information about climate change. By contrast, those who say the problem is not serious are far more likely to think the media are doing a bad job (46%) than a good job (16%).

Combined with their relatively high use of alternative sources such as social media this might suggest a loss of confidence by this group in the mainstream media. This may be due to how trustworthy or biased they think the news media are when it comes to reporting on climate change. As we’ve already learned, in the United States much of this relates to the highly charged political atmosphere and how this colours views on the mainstream media in general:

Lies about climate control because [the] Democrats are full of shit.

Male, 37, US

Elsewhere critics from both left and right accuse the media of not being bold enough in their coverage, being relentlessly doom-laden and negative, and following hidden agendas. Many of these critiques are not specific to climate change and are part of wider concerns about the news media:

I don’t trust corporate media sources to be frank enough about climate change.

Male, 55–64, US

Twitter, allows people to speak freely on matters they know about such as climate change without the propaganda/indoctrination newspapers and TV has.

Female, 18–24, UK

I would rather read a balanced report that looks at all factors than the ‘we’re doomed’ coming from the likes of the BBC or Sky News.

Male, 18–24, UK

We observe a similar story when we ask about how well the media perform in terms of helping them understand what they can do personally about climate change, with an overall consensus that the media are doing a good job, but a minority that take a very different view.

Conclusion

The majority of our respondents express serious concern about climate change, with only a minority that disagrees. But at least part of this group has different news consumption habits about climate change than the rest. They are highly critical of the mainstream media and often use alternative sources including social media. These attitudes are not unique to climate change but the issue reflects the existing strong divisions among different segments of the population – especially in countries that already have high levels of political polarisation.⁵

Young people are not as disapproving of the mainstream media while still embracing alternative media sources in a search for authenticity and more diverse points of view. All of this is challenging for news organisations in terms of catering for different audiences and producing content in new formats. There is also a new level of competition with influencers and celebrities where journalists are now just one source amongst many.

Some media organisations are responding to these trends by taking a clearer stand. The Guardian, for example, has started to talk about ‘climate emergency’ rather than climate change. Other publications have started to take more content that is sponsored by NGOs and foundations with an interest in shifting policy choices. But any shift towards more campaigning journalism will also need to bear in mind the partisan differences in attitude to the subject revealed in this report and the widespread desire for a lack of hidden agendas if trust is to be maintained.

But this crisis has also shown how much local news still matters as people try to learn about the spread of the virus in their area as well as hear the advice of local government, which has sometimes taken a different approach to national guidelines. This pandemic has reinforced the democratic importance of local reporting in providing timely and relevant local information as well as holding local politicians to account.

In this section we offer an international perspective on how local and regional news are valued across different countries and what sources of local news people prefer. We also look at the extent to which people would miss their favourite local news outlet if it was no longer available.

Measuring local and regional news consumption across 40 countries is no easy task. The markets in our sample differ hugely in their size – from large city states like Singapore and Hong Kong to giant loosely connected federations like Brazil and the United States. Political systems vary greatly in their degree of regional autonomy, which may influence the relative importance of local, regional, and national news. While recognising these differences, our aim was to provide a common way of understanding how people in different countries think about news that is closer to their home. In this regard, we gave our survey respondents a relatively wide definition of local news that could include ‘news from the city or town, municipality or region that they live in’.

Does the Public Value Local News?

Even before the COVID-19 crisis, almost half our survey respondents (47%) across countries said that they were very or extremely interested in local news. This compares with 37% who said they were interested in politics. If we break this down via market, we observe striking differences, with interest highest in countries with a federal system or a high degree of regional autonomy. Almost three-quarters of Brazilians (73%) say they are interested in local news, two-thirds of Spaniards (62%), and around half (54%) in Germany and the United States (48%). By contrast, people who live in countries with more centralised systems show comparatively little interest in local news, though it is important to note that there may be many other factors explaining the differences found in our data. Only 31% say they are interested in the UK and France and the number drops down to 12% in South Korea.

The Demographic Challenge

While overall interest remains high, local news organisations have struggled to adapt to new digital platforms and in many cases local newspapers had continued to prioritise the economic importance of their print products – at least before the crisis (Jenkins and Nielsen 2020). This is partly because its core audience tends to be more traditional but also because local media have invested more slowly in product innovations such as mobile sites and video formats. Even in Norway, a country that is often held up as a model for sustainable local news, businesses remain highly dependent on a large number of over-55s who are three times as likely to be interested in local news as 18–24s. It’s a similar story in Germany and the US where older generations show much more interest in local news. Only in a few countries, such as the Philippines, Mexico and Chile, do we see relatively high interest with younger groups.

To some extent these findings are in line with what we find generally in news, with the young always somewhat less interested than the older generations. It is possible that they could grow into a local news habit as they age, but only if the agenda, tone, and content are right. Other demographics show a different and more surprising pattern. Interest in local news seems to be more evenly spread across those with high and low educational attainment than it is for other types of news. Indeed, in some markets, such as the United Kingdom, interest is greater amongst those with lower levels of education. This is worth noting as information inequalities are likely to get even worse if local news outlets contract or disappear.

Where Do People Get Local News?

While local news businesses have struggled in their move to online, other regional and local actors have made use of digital infrastructures to establish direct contact with their relevant communities. Facebook groups, political parties, local enterprises, schools, and churches now represent important supplements to and sometimes serious competition to traditional local news online as they provide hyperlocal information important to very specific audiences that may have never been looking for the whole local news package anyway (Möhring and Keldenich 2018). During the COVID-19 crisis local Facebook groups stepped up their game as they helped to drive support for local businesses affected by the pandemic.²

Our data show that these alternative providers are indeed competing strongly, with about half of our surveyed respondents across all markets using them. However, traditional local news sources still lead overall, with 71% of all those surveyed across countries relying on offline and online services offered by traditional local news media. On average, across countries local newspapers remain most important (44%), followed by local TV (33%). But local radio (24%) is already less important than some of the non-news alternatives. Across countries, almost a third (31%) of our sample say they used local groups or pages on social media (e.g. Facebook or WhatsApp) or online discussion groups in the last week as a source for local news. Personal communication from other residents, neighbours, friends, and/or family are seen as important sources for around a quarter (28%) across markets, while 13% say they rely on information coming directly from local institutions. The gap between news media and non-news media is now just 20 points, with new online forums providing a free, convenient, and relevant alternative.

Looking into individual countries, we see some variation in terms of importance. The newspaper dominates in Norway (64%) and Germany (57%) – both countries with strong reading traditions – but television is significantly ahead in the Philippines and the United States. Over half (55%) in the US use local TV weekly, with 36% reading local newspapers and a quarter tuning to local radio.

Social media are particularly important in the Philippines, which has one of the highest uses of Facebook in our survey. Four in ten (41%) of our online sample say they have relied on local social media groups in the past week. This number rises to 59% in Hong Kong and 56% in Kenya but is far lower in Germany (15%) as well as Japan (14%). In the US, where Facebook launched a big local news initiative in 2019, only 20% say they use local social media groups weekly. Findings for the US are mirrored by Pew data from two years ago showing that ‘social media plays a moderate role in local news’.³

Value of Different News Sources Compared

Local news media remain important to people in different neighbourhoods but how much would they miss them if they were no longer there? Across all countries, 37% of those that use local TV say they would miss it a lot and a further 41% would miss it somewhat. We see similar results for local newspapers with 35% saying they would miss them a lot and 43% saying somewhat. We see some country differences, partly aligned with usage of particular sources, but also with the extent of devolved political power – and therefore the importance of local news in the democratic process.

In Germany more than half of local TV (56%) or local newspaper users (54%) would strongly miss their local news source. This is only true for 25% of TV users and 20% of newspaper users in the Philippines.

Local News along Political Lines

Local news is often considered to provide journalism that is more trusted and less partisan than national publications. This is partly a function of the fact that many local outlets have a commercial interest in serving the widest group of users and many public media outlets have obligations to do so. In other words, local media often do not have the luxury of reporting on behalf of one political side while ignoring the other. There are some exceptions, however, not least in the United States where some local media groups have recently been accused of supporting right-wing political agendas.⁴

Similarly, some local newspapers in Germany were reproached for reporting rather uncritically about the right-wing populist party AfD. At the same time, local journalists have reported about being excluded from particular party events – in some cities they even face death threats and attacks against their offices.⁵

Our data show that in many of our surveyed markets regional and local news generally fare well in terms of trust. In the US and France, local news is the most trusted news brand, while in Finland, Norway, and Germany local newspapers are second to public broadcasters, that have also built much of their reputation on local TV and radio services. In the UK, local newspapers are trusted by 55%, fourth in the list and much higher than the average for commercial media. Elsewhere, local news brands are typically trusted by more than half the surveyed population – for example, in Mexico (59%) and the Philippines (64%).

POSITION OF LOCAL NEWS IN LIST OF MOST TRUSTED NEWS BRANDS

Selected markets

Q6_2018_trust. How trustworthy would you say news from the following brands is? Please use the scale below, where 0 is ‘not at all trustworthy’ and 10 is ‘completely trustworthy’.
Base: Total sample in each market: Spain = 2006, US = 2055, France = 2038, UK = 2011, Germany = 2011, Norway = 2010, Finland = 2050.

Will Local News Have a Chance?

The COVID-19 crisis is focusing minds both on the value of local reporting but also on what could soon be lost. While some titles have already disappeared, others have been trying to demonstrate the value they can still provide with front pages and reporting that helps people get through the crisis.

But the economic pressures are building. Changes that might have unfolded over a decade are now set to happen in a much more compressed timescale and support will be needed. Facebook has already pledged a $100m package for local media, Google has announced a new Journalism Emergency Relief Fund, and some governments have stepped up with interim funding and other forms of support on a much more significant scale. But the crisis will unquestionably hurt the business of news, including local, far more than any of these packages can make up for. The long-term survival of local news will therefore depend on finding new sustainable business models, attracting the next generation of users, and moving faster towards online content and engagement. At the same time, professionally curated journalism for local areas still matters, offering orientation to readers and reflecting local interests. Local news organisations will have to prove themselves creative and courageous in order to quickly react to an ever-changing technological environment. The good news is that our data suggest there is still demand and trust for them – in general and even more so in times of crisis. The next year will be a real test to see how much local news is truly valued by audiences and governments across the world.

Of course, much remains the same, but there’s also a sense that the news media are struggling to adapt to this new world, and may not always be as capable of holding politicians to account at a time when they have less control over what eventually reaches the public.

Journalists, politicians, academics, and other observers have offered a range of opinions on what the media should do in response, but the views of news audiences are rarely solicited – something that seems odd given that many news organisations have become increasingly audience focused in recent years. Few would argue that audiences should completely dictate journalistic practice, or the policy of the technology platforms, but what they think still matters – because journalism exists within the context of the audience.

In this section we present data on what the audience thinks about three key issues: (i) whether the media should report false statements from politicians, (ii) whether politicians should be able to advertise on platforms, and (iii) whether platforms should fact-check political adverts.

Somewhat unusually, we tend to find clear answers to these questions – both across countries and across different demographic groups. Most people think journalists should report false statements from politicians even if it gives them unwarranted attention, and most people think that platforms should block political adverts that contain inaccuracies even if it ultimately means the platforms become the arbiters of truth. However, whether or not people think political parties should be allowed to advertise on platforms in the first place seems to depend on the current rules governing political advertising on television.

Most of the time, and in most countries, there is a consensus on these issues that stretches across the left-right political spectrum. But we see different views when we look at people with different levels of interest in politics – with the most interested tending to prefer more open political communication environments that reflect the status quo.

A Note on the Questions

The issues covered here are complicated, so designing questions to tap people’s views on them is challenging. To simplify them for our respondents, we framed them as either/or issues by asking people to select one of two options (plus a don’t know), and worded them in a way that hinted at the underlying concerns. Of course, there is an infinite number of alternative wordings, some of which may produce different results.

A common reaction from journalists and academics to issues such as whether the news media should report false statements is to say that ‘it’s too complicated’ or ‘it depends’, and to conclude that it’s impossible to generalise across different situations. That may be partly true, but it is important to understand that – rightly or wrongly – most people are able to do this. Around 80–85% of people express a clear view to the questions included here, with the rest saying they don’t know. Don’t know responses are less common among those with higher education and higher political interest, so it seems unlikely that people ‘don’t know’ because it’s too complicated – rather, most are likely from people who don’t have strong views one way or the other.

People Want the Media to Report Potentially Dubious Statements from Politicians

A key concern for many media organisations across the world is how to cover politicians who have a reputation for consistently making false statements. Some worry that repeating false statements – even if they are fact-checked and clearly labelled as such – still gives politicians the attention they crave. In March 2020, some US media pundits similarly questioned whether it was right to live broadcast President Trump’s COVID-19 press conferences given that they might contain misinformation about the virus.¹ On the other hand, some might argue that news organisations have a duty to report what politicians have said, regardless of whether it’s true or false.

And it’s this, it seems, that comes closer to what most people would prefer. In almost every market, people say that, when the media has to deal with a statement from a politician that could be false, they would prefer them to ‘report the statement prominently because it is important for the public to know what the politician said’ rather than ‘not emphasise the statement because it would give the politician unwarranted attention’.²

In Sweden, where the difference is very large, 62% of people would prefer the statement to be reported prominently, compared to just 10% who think the statement should be downplayed. We see the same pattern in the US and the UK, and indeed, in almost all other markets. Only in Chile is there some evidence that the opposite might be true, with 48% saying statements should be downplayed, and 40% saying they should be reported.

We might expect this preference for reporting to be even stronger if statements are reported as false, but it is important to understand that there are many situations where this is simply not possible. What’s clear, though, is that most people are uncomfortable with the idea of the news media hiding information from the public – even if they think it might be for the greater good.

As well as being consistent across almost all countries, this general view appears to be consistent across a range of different socio-demographic groups like age, gender, and political leaning. Even in the US, where some might assume partisan differences due to different political styles, a majority of those on the left (58%) and right (53%) would prefer potentially false statements to be reported prominently – though perhaps for different reasons.

However, if we look at differences by interest in politics across all markets, we see that, as interest goes up, people are more likely to take a view (as opposed to saying they don’t know), and that view is more likely to be that the news media should report what politicians have said. Those with the highest levels of political interest are around twice as likely to prefer potentially false statements from politicians to be reported.

People Less Comfortable with Politicians Advertising on Social Media

Recent debates about the role of the media in society have also focused on political advertising. Some countries have long had strict rules dictating how politicians and political parties advertise on television, but in many cases these rules have not been extended to social media. Furthermore, the potential for micro-targeting on some social networks, together with a lack of transparency over what each person sees on their feed, has led some commentators to question whether any form of political advertising should be permitted. In October 2019 Twitter announced that it would ban all forms political advertising, shortly after Mark Zuckerberg ruled out the possibility of a similar ban on Facebook, and in November, Google said it would no longer permit campaigns to micro-target voters with certain ads based on political attributes.

What do people think about this issue? Across countries, around half of all people surveyed (50%) think that politicians should be able to advertise on TV, but people are more sceptical about political advertising on platforms – which has 41% approval.

But in a sense, this misses the point, because the picture varies a lot by country, and in turn, the existing rules within that country. Support for political advertising on television tends to be lower in European countries like Germany, Denmark, and Norway, where regulation is already quite tight. Support in the US – where there are few restrictions – is much higher at 68%, and higher still among those on the right (83%).

This is important because if people approve of political advertising on TV, they normally approve of advertising on platforms too. Across all markets, 69% of those that approve of political advertising on television also approve of it on platforms. Similarly, 81% of those that think advertising on television should be banned also think that it should not be permitted on search and social either. The thinking seems to be, ‘if it’s OK for them to advertise on television, why can’t they advertise on social media too?’

This pattern also applies at the country level. If we plot national support for political advertising on television against support for political advertising on platforms we can see that the two go hand in hand.

People Want Technology Companies to Block Dubious Political Adverts

Of course, this view may be based on the assumption that political advertising on platforms will be held to the same standard and will work in broadly the same way. But we know that advertising on platforms differs quite strikingly, in terms of the transparency of the underlying technology, the ability to target certain groups, and the opportunity to disseminate thousands of adverts with different messages. A study by First Draft during the recent 2019 UK General Election found that a significant number of adverts from all political parties contained statements that had been flagged as (at least) partially incorrect by independent fact-checkers.³ This prompts important questions about the veracity of claims made in political advertising on platforms – and if and how it should be policed.

Assuming that most platforms continue to allow political advertising in some form – thus allowing them to sidestep the crucial issue of what counts as ‘political’ – then some might argue that they are responsible for ensuring that the information they contain is true. Others might have serious concerns about allowing technology companies to be the ones who decide between true and false.

Despite this, in all but a handful of countries, most people say they want technology companies to block advertisements from political parties that could be inaccurate, because they have a responsibility to ensure that information on their platform is accurate. The word could is important here, because it suggests that people would prefer platforms to err on the side of caution, and that people overwhelmingly want platforms to block adverts that are unquestionably false. Either way, there is little evidence of widespread concern over letting technology companies make decisions about what to block and what to allow. In particular in polarised and political disputes, platform companies may not want to be ‘arbiters of truth’ – and politicians may not want them to be either, at least when on the receiving end of content moderation – but much of the public seems to have no principled opposition to the companies taking on this role, at least for political advertising.

However, support for platforms stepping back from making decisions about veracity starts to grow if we focus on those with higher level of interest in politics. Those most interested in politics are twice as likely to favour platforms allowing political adverts that may contain inaccuracies. To connect this with an earlier finding, it seems that those most interested in politics have a stronger preference for more open environments for political communication, with fewer actors responsible for censoring information – even if it means that more falsehoods circulate.

However, unlike the previous question about whether the media should report potentially false statements, left-right partisanship does matter in some countries. In Germany, both left and right would prefer to see platforms block political adverts that could contain inaccuracies, but in the US, those on the right think they should be allowed.

The data cannot tell us why those with high political interest prefer the news media to adopt a more laissez-faire approach to politics. It may be because they feel better equipped to navigate a media environment like this and find it difficult to imagine the problems others might face, or perhaps because they feel better served by the status quo – where in most cases the media report false statements by politicians, and platforms do not fact-check political adverts.

Of course, media companies should not necessarily change their practices just to meet the preferences of the audience. These are difficult questions, and no response can satisfy everyone. We have focused on political claims here, but potentially inaccurate claims about coronavirus, for example, can have a direct human cost – and surely require a different approach.

But if the way politicians and political parties use the media is fundamentally changing, then the media may have to make some changes too. No amount of data on audience preferences can tell us exactly how, but it can highlight some of the problems with simplistic solutions. For example, it is sometimes said that the way to deal with politicians who lie is simply to stop reporting what they say. But no one likes to feel that things are being kept from them. So, are those who say this really describing a media environment they themselves would like to inhabit – or just one they would prefer other people to live in?

Previous research has highlighted a sharp increase in their production in recent years, both by ‘legacy’ print and newer digital media publishers (Jack 2016). The trend mirrors the continued importance of email in daily life, and its widespread use in marketing, despite the emergence of more sophisticated digital tools. In this chapter we explore in detail the role played by email news, how publishers are developing their editorial products, and why audiences value the format.

Looking first at consumption across countries, we find significant differences, with over a quarter (28%) using email news each week in Belgium, a fifth (21%) in the United States but around one in ten in Sweden (10%), South Korea (9%), and the UK (9%). The reasons for these differences are not entirely clear but may be related to the extent to which popular publishers have invested in and promoted the format compared with other channels. In countries like South Africa (24%) where bandwidth is expensive, text-based emails can also be an efficient way to distribute online news.

Only 16% across countries regularly use emails but these users tend to be much more interested in news and have more disposable household income. This makes them a very attractive set of consumers for publishers of all types.

Email news users also tend to be older, with over-45s proportionally much more likely to receive them. By comparison, we find that mobile notifications are used equally across age groups. Email is popular both with news lovers – those who have high interest and high frequency of access – as well as with daily briefers, who tend to access news at a number of set times each day. Email is not a good way to engage casual users, who tend to favour channels where the news ‘comes to them’, such as television or social media.

Different Types of Emails

Across 21 countries, where we asked detailed questions around email news, we find that daily updates are the most popular type (60%) of email. These editorial mails which are typically sent early in the morning provide a useful way for readers to cope with a growing information overload.

I use FT Breaking news – it is usually one of the first to break the story, it’s concise so I can glance at it on the go, it covers important events that I care about and is a useful prompt to find out more if I want to.

Male survey respondent, 34, UK

News organisations such as the New York Times and the Washington Post each offer almost 70 different scheduled emails showcasing the work of different parts of the newsroom including business, technology, culture, and sport. Many have also developed ‘pop-up’ newsletters to provide depth on a big ongoing story like coronavirus or the 2020 US presidential election. Beyond scheduled emails, three-quarters of our sample (73%) have also signed up for an email that is triggered by an event – such as a breaking news alert or one based on a specific subject or person that interests them. These emails may come from publishers or from news aggregators like Google News or Nuzzel.

REGULAR BRIEFING EMAILS OFFERED BY THE NEW YORK TIMES

Emails function halfway between print and digital. Like articles in a newspaper, they cannot be corrected, updated, or easily modified once sent. They tend to use a constrained layout, which may provide some photographs and graphics alongside text, but rarely more sophisticated or dynamic content. They are often appreciated for their simplicity, but also for how they can showcase journalism in a more personal way for specific groups of people:

The [New York Times] Daily Update is a good mix of the most important news of the day at the top, then other articles of interest toward the bottom

Female, 34, US

The Atlantic Daily helps pull me away from the daily news cycle and toward longer-cycle stories

Male, 39, US

Once just a series of automated links, the most successful emails are treated as an editorial product hosted by a senior journalist who brings an informal tone and personal touch which has often been lacking in digital media. The New York Times recently appointed David Leonhardt as anchor of the morning briefing newsletter, which it also revealed has more than 17m subscribers. The use of the term ‘anchor’, a term borrowed from network TV, shows the value now placed on human curation; on guiding audiences through the news of the day.¹

In the UK Matt Chorley played a similar role for six years as host of the popular Red Box update for The Times newspaper – mixing politics, humour, and various types of user interaction.

I enjoy Times Red Box because it condenses the last day’s politics news in a light-hearted way

Female, 35, UK

Chorley has used the email as a springboard to build a wider personal brand with a weekly podcast, and a nationwide stand-up comedy tour. Now he’s giving up the newsletter to take up a new role as a host on the recently launched Times Radio.

Newsletters tend to be free to all, allowing content to be sampled with the hope that engaged readers can then be converted into subscribers. But they can be equally valuable in providing regular prompts for existing customers to use the product more regularly.

An email saves me going to the web site to find nothing interests me and acts as a reminder to see what’s going on

Male 44, UK subscriber to the update email of the Sheffield Star UK

How Many Emails is Too Many?

People in the US get, on average, more emails from different news providers (4) than those in the UK (3). Our analysis shows that American email users are also twice as likely to receive politically focused emails (47%) compared with the average across countries (26%). Emails are particularly important for partisan news providers with The Daily Signal, The Blaze, The Daily Caller on the right and the Daily Kos on the left mentioned frequently by our survey respondents.

Given the relatively high number of emails received, it is striking that on average across our 21 countries almost half (44%) say they read most of their emails each day. A further 37% say they read some of their emails, with only 18% saying they read none or just a few. Publisher data show that the most popular news emails can get open rates of up to 80%, though industry averages tend to be closer to 30%.² The New York Times reports an open rate of around 60% for its morning update newsletter.³

The Role of Email in Building Loyalty

For subscription businesses email is often a critical weapon in reducing churn – the rate at which people stop paying for the service. Publishers like the Wall Street Journal and the Financial Times try to get new subscribers to take up email newsletters in the first few weeks because the data show that this increases engagement, which in turn reduces churn. According to our data, in Belgium and the United States publishers have managed to get around four in ten (37%) digital or joint digital/print subscribers to use email newsletters. But levels are much lower in many Nordic countries – despite equally high levels of paying for news. In Norway only 14% of subscribers access email weekly, with similar numbers in Sweden (15%) and Finland (19%). Despite their extreme sophistication in using data it seems there is much to learn from American and Belgian publishers on how they are driving more regular engagement through the number, quality, and focus of their emails.

Email news is no silver bullet solution. It is still a minority activity that appeals mostly to older readers and the format can be restrictive. But despite its relative unsophistication, it does remain one of the most important tools available to publishers for building habit and attracting the type of customers that can help with monetisation (subscription or advertising).

With publishers stepping up email production there is a huge amount of choice for consumers, so it is more important than ever to create distinctive content that fills specific audience needs. Our respondent comments show that many consumers appreciate morning and evening briefings because they are easy to skim and save time. Others like the tone of voice and humour that can be provided by a personality guiding people though the news every day – like a television anchor. Others still find email a more efficient way to keeping in touch with a specialist subject area than, for example, browsing through a website.

While specific email formats continue to evolve over time, the characteristics of the most successful – simplicity, finish-ability, curation, and serendipity – are finding parallels in other forms of journalistic output and will be increasingly valuable over time in a world of information abundance and overload.

Our data collection took place before many countries experienced a dramatic rise in reported coronavirus cases, so it cannot speak directly to these issues. But it does provide key information on the situation faced by publishers going into the crisis – much of which will still be relevant today, as past changes to attitudes and behaviour around paying for news have tended to be gradual rather than sudden.

Method

This year we took a more detailed look at online news subscriptions. To do this, we used a separate online survey in three countries – Norway, the US, and the UK – that focused on paying for news. Most of data described here come from this survey. As always, survey data are not necessarily fully aligned with self-reported figures from the industry – each source has different strengths and weaknesses, with survey research best suited for getting at demographic and attitudinal patterns around certain behaviours.

In Norway, paying for online news is more widespread than in any other market in our survey, at around 45%. In the US, paying for online news is relatively common (20%), rising sharply after the election of Donald Trump. In the UK, paying for online news is yet to take off, with fewer than one in ten paying in the last year.

We used sample sizes of around 4,000 people in the US and the UK to ensure that the group that pays for online news was large enough to analyse separately (in Norway, as a higher proportion of people pay for online news, the paying group is large enough with a sample size of 2,000). The surveys used different questions to our main Digital News Report survey, but these questions tended to produce quite similar results. For example, figures for the proportion of people paying for online news were within the margin of error for both surveys.

Single Brand Access Still Dominates

Let’s first consider people who have access to news that you would normally have to pay for. It makes sense to start here because some people have access to paywalled news through free trials, via their job, and so on. We will come on to those who actually pay with their own money later.

There are different forms of access, but the three most common are subscriptions to online news from a single brand, subscriptions to a print/digital bundle from a single brand, and a subscription to multiple brands aggregated in one place. Of these, digital-only subscriptions to a single brand are the most common form of access in all three countries. Print-digital bundles have clearly proved successful in Norway, with 20% of online news users currently using them to access paid online news. Paid news aggregators are relatively popular in the US, mainly thanks to Apple News+, but at the moment these are far less common than subscriptions to single news brands.

A Winner-Takes-Most Market

As we saw in the Executive Summary, people mainly have access to one of a small group of prominent brands. In the US, over half of these people have access to either the New York Times or the Washington Post, and in the UK, it’s The Times or the Telegraph. Norway is different because many people have access to paid news from a range of different local and regional newspapers, with national titles like VG and Aftenposten also popular. As we described in last year’s report, most people only have access to paid news from one brand, creating winner-takes-most dynamics, but a significant minority in the US and Norway take out subscriptions to more than one title – often a local or specialist title in addition to a national one.

Most Access is Being Paid for

Up to this point we’ve referred to people who have ‘access to online news that you would normally have to pay for’. However, most of this group have access because they are paying for subscriptions with their own money – 75% in Norway and the UK, and 84% in the US. For under-45s the figure is lower. But among those 45 and over, the vast majority of those who have access are paying with their own money.

Motivations for Paying for News

The reasons for subscribing to an online publication are complex and partly affected by supply-side factors such as the amount of high-quality free news available. In the United States and especially Norway, many publishers have introduced paywalls, which means more people will be asked to pay – perhaps heightening a sense of scarcity and creating a feeling that news could be worth paying for. In the UK, by contrast, only a relatively small number of publications try to charge for news.

Beyond this, we see subscribers weighing up personal benefits, such as distinctive content, convenience, and value, with perceived benefits for society – such as having a strong and independent media able to hold politicians to account. In this regard it is interesting to compare the different reasons subscribers give in the United States and United Kingdom for paying for online news.

Overall, the most important factor is the distinctiveness and quality of the content. In both countries, subscribers believe they are getting better information than from free sources. More than a third cite a close affinity with a particular journalist as a reason to subscribe. In the US we find more people prepared to pay to get ahead in their job (13% compared to just 3% in the UK) and this tallies with a bigger proportion subscribing to finance publications like the Wall Street Journal. The competitive nature of the US market, with multiple publications chasing subscriptions, is also making subscribers more aware of value, with one-third citing getting a ‘good deal‘ as a reason to subscribe.

I have an excellent discount with my Prime subscription and with the excellent reporting, there’s no reason not to continue it.

Female, 64, Washington Post subscriber

Subscribers in the US are also more likely to say they want to help fund good journalism (52% compared with 39% in the UK). We know from our earlier surveys that much of the recent surge in subscriptions in the United States has come from those wanting to support liberal publications critical of Donald Trump – but there’s also a more fundamental desire for quality journalism. These respondent comments were typical of many in our survey:

It’s never been a more important time to fund great, vetted journalism like the Times and the Post.

Female, 59, New York Times subscriber

I like to sponsor local newspaper journalists. They are a dying breed.

Female, 58, local newspaper subscriber

One interesting theme from our respondent comments was the sense of value that comes from additional elements, such as recipes and crosswords, that are often bundled in with the core news offer. The Times of London also runs regular competitions and discounts for artistic events that were widely mentioned in our open-ended questions. These additional elements seem to be particularly valuable for retention as they build habit and are less replicable elsewhere.

For Norwegians too the distinctiveness of content came out on top along with convenience and ease of use. ‘Aftenposten is a serious newspaper with great quality’, said one respondent, but it was striking that ‘supporting good journalism’ is less of a motivation (21%) – perhaps because mainstream media outlets are seen as less polarised in Norway.

Most People Think they Will Still Be Paying Next Year

Around 80–90% of people paying with their own money think they are at least somewhat likely to still be paying for access this time next year. Additionally, around half of those who currently have free access say that they might start paying if their free access runs out. This is encouraging, and perhaps more encouraging still is that these figures imply retention rates that are comparable to those for subscriptions to video and audio streaming services like Netflix and Spotify.

It’s worth keeping in mind that these data describe what people think they will do in the future, and were collected before a pandemic that has left many people financially worse off. It can also be seen as a useful reminder that people do not necessarily subscribe forever, and boasts about the number of ‘new subscribers’ may not be telling the whole story. There’s substantial ‘churn’ in this area, as many people end their free trials before they have to pay, or simply cancel their subscriptions to spend their money on other things. Lapsed subscribers tended to be younger and often much more price conscious:

The price was too high compared to the value the information I was given.

Female, 37, Norway

It cost way too much and I can get round the paywall.

Male, 36, US

Too expensive, felt there was nothing I couldn’t get for free on Apple News.

Female, 19, UK

In the UK, the number of people that used to have access to paid news (10%) is close to the number of people that currently have access (9%) – with the equivalent figures from the US and Norway higher still (albeit lower than the number of people with access). Increasing subscriber numbers is in part about tempting people back to news, as well as encouraging people to pay for the first time.

How Can Publishers Attract New Subscribers?

As we’ve already seen, existing subscribers are relatively happy, but with income from digital advertising uncertain many publishers will be looking to increase the number of new subscribers. In comparing our three countries we see some interesting differences that could inform publisher strategies.

First, we observe a very high proportion (40% in the US and 50% in the UK) who say that nothing could persuade them to pay. Many of these have low interest in news, or are sufficiently happy with the many free news sources available in these countries. But in Norway, where interest in news tends to be higher – and where free news is more restricted – only 19% say they couldn’t be persuaded.

Price and convenience are some of the key factors that could make a difference. In Norway, a third (30%) say they might subscribe if it was cheaper and 17% if they could pay to access multiple sites from a single payment. Others were interested in exploring family logins, similar to those offered by Netflix or Spotify. Publishers have increasingly been offering differential pricing to pick up business from those unlikely to pay full price (e.g. overseas customers and students). Paying to avoid intrusive advertisements is another potential route for publishers, with around one in seven respondents in all three countries saying this this might tempt them to subscribe.

Going forward, news organisations will want to consider these signals about value of both price and user experience more closely. As we have argued before, people often weigh up one media subscription against another and the way news is currently sold does not always fit the requirements for easy, flexible, uncluttered access to multiple sources that people say they would like.

[I cancelled my subscription because] it was expensive and only one view, and I prefer a summary from different sources to try and balance bias

Male, 69, UK

Instead, the messaging is often around restrictions and barriers. Having said that, it is important to note that one-stop-shop paid aggregators have made limited headway for news – perhaps because they do not always include a comprehensive mix of the best content. The fear of missing out can be a powerful barrier.

People Wary about Registering with News Sites

Some outlets now ask readers to register with them in order to be able to access a small number of articles for free. Many journalists would see this as a fair trade-off, but the public are more wary. In all three countries fewer than half think registering is a fair trade, but it’s also clear that people are not strongly opposed either. Between a fifth and a quarter are unsure, perhaps because it’s often unclear why news outlets want people to register in the first place, and what they will do with any user data they collect.

Only a Minority Trying to Sidestep Paywalls

Between 13% and 22% in our three countries say they registered to access news content in the last year. Some are also using other techniques to get around paywalls – such as resetting cookies, changing their browser settings, or even downloading dedicated software. Just a third say they have ever tried to do something like this, as it requires a certain level of digital literacy, and many are probably unaware that is a possibility. Some may simply be content with what they can access for free.

People have different views about the rights and wrongs of attempting to sidestep paywalls. Few would argue that this is always justifiable, but some people do have reservations about important public-interest journalism only being available to those willing and able to pay for it. A paywalled exposé of the UK government’s handling of the coronavirus outbreak by the Sunday Times led to a heated debate about the issue on Twitter, with some attempting to openly share the full article. Other outlets decided to make most of their coronavirus coverage free to access, as they have for other big events in the past.

Across all markets, 20% say they are ‘very’ or ‘extremely’ concerned about people missing out on paywalled news – about the same number who say they are ‘not at all’ concerned. People express similar levels of concern over the fact they themselves might be missing out. Journalists understandably have strong views on this issue, but it is not something that concerns the public.

The data here were collected before the coronavirus situation really became a crisis in the US, the UK, and Norway. But it seems very likely that the coronavirus pandemic has increased the pressure on many news outlets to make money from digital news. We’ve already seen how some outlets have changed their messaging around paywalls, or become stricter about ad-blockers. In the longer term, it is possible that the gravity of the situation will prompt people to reconsider their attitudes towards news, and crucially, how much they value it. Time will tell.

Most Podcast Listeners are Young

The most striking aspect of podcast consumption is the appeal to younger people. In Sweden and the United States, two countries that have embraced podcasts most, we find that over half of under 35s have used a podcast monthly compared with less than a fifth of over 55s.

By contrast, these older listeners are twice as likely to consume traditional radio news as the young, many of whom do not even own a radio. This is the plugged-in smartphone generation and it’s no surprise that the majority of usage is through these connected devices, many of which come pre-installed with podcast apps and now come equipped with high fidelity wireless headphones. In the UK, 55% of listening takes place via smartphone, a figure that rises to 62% for under 35s.

PROPORTION THAT USED EACH DEVICE TO LISTEN TO PODCASTS
United Kingdom

Where do People Listen to Podcasts?

The majority of podcast usage is at home (64%), commuting on public transport (24%) or via private transport such as the car or bike (20%). Around a fifth (18%) listen when out and about generally (going for a walk or to the shops), with a similar proportion (16%) listening when taking exercise. A further 16% finds the time or opportunity to listen to podcasts at work. Younger groups are slightly more likely to listen on the move, whereas over 45s are twice as likely to listen in the home.

PODCAST MOMENTS: WHAT PEOPLE SAY

Commuting Time

The average length of podcasts – typically between 20 and 40 minutes – is partly influenced by the time taken on the average commute. This is particularly true for the news industry where the Guardian’s Daily News podcast Today in Focus gets much of its listening during the morning rush hour. Post Reports from the Washington Post is released in time for the evening commute. Americans are much more likely to listen in the car, according to our data, where they spend more time generally, while Europeans are more likely to listen when using public transport. One exception is Denmark where listening to podcasts or music on a bicycle has become a part of daily routines for many.

Why Podcasts?

Across all our countries, the main reasons for listening to podcasts are to keep updated about topics of personal interest (46%) and to learn something new (39%). Other motivations include to fill empty time (25%) and as a change from music (22%). But these reasons do not play out equally across age groups. Older listeners are more interested in keeping updated whereas the young are looking for podcasts that entertain them or fill empty time.

Looking specifically at the UK we also can see important differences between the younger age groups: 18–24s – which we have previously referred to as Gen Z – are less likely to be looking to learn or be updated, and more likely to be looking for entertainment or a change from music; 25–34s, or Gen Y, are also looking to be entertained, but want to fill empty time with content that is educational and keeps them updated.

Further insights on motivation came from our in-depth interviews with young people, supporting this year’s research. The first relates to the convenience. Podcasts are great for multitasking but they also don’t require complex interfaces:

I think it’s a bit more passive … You’re able to multitask. Like, I can cook and listen to a podcast, for example.

Sam, 25-30, US

In this sense podcasts bring information to listeners in a way that is effortless, but the linear nature is a welcome break from the usual distractions of digital media. On the other hand, they maintain the element of control and choice that is second nature to millennials and digital natives, but that traditional radio lacks:

[With] radio you can’t control what shows are on, whereas podcasts you can.
Mark, 31–35, US

Then there is the content itself, which young people feel is often more diverse, more entertaining, and less stuffy than traditional radio. The characters and hosts often bring a more informal style and they tell stories in a more natural and less affected way.

[Podcasts are] more of an outsider source of news or opinion, so you have a diverse range of news ideas and thoughts from vastly different people; not your traditional people who look and act a certain way.

Chloe, 31–35, UK

What Podcasts?

Given the insights above, it is worth noting that politics and news (15%) is just one part of the content universe. Other popular genres include lifestyle content (15%), true crime (15%), specialist interest (14%), and sports (9%). But many podcasts defy classification with news often discussed in new ways through comedy and celebrity. Young people are listening to podcasts that entertain and inform. This is why many daily podcasts like The Daily from the New York Times use narrative storytelling techniques pioneered in true crime formats such as Serial to add suspense and jeopardy, to keep listeners hooked. Vice and others are applying these techniques to blockbuster documentaries (e.g. Chapo, Kingpin on Trial).

In this chapter we have seen how podcasts carry many of the same benefits as radio – such as multitasking and ease of use – but they have characteristics of their own which are enhancing audio storytelling and engaging new groups.

In the home, the flexibility and control offered by podcasts is supplementing and in some cases replacing traditional radio, but podcasting is also taking audio to new locations where there is no easy access to radio. Audio rich smartphones enable audio to compete with newspapers, apps, and websites on public transport for the first time and it makes routine tasks like walking the dog or exercising in the gym less boring and more productive.

Critically, podcasts are bringing fresh voices and production techniques to a medium that has changed little in a generation. Low barriers to entry, combined with high levels of creativity, are shaking the foundations of the radio industry.

For publishers many questions remain, not least the overlap with traditional news, the influence of platforms, and the questions of monetisation. The platform picture is changing fast with Spotify and Google joining Apple in a race for the best content. Business models are still emerging but the evidence in this chapter about the underlying drivers of this change suggest we are a long way from reaching ‘peak podcast’.

Here, we make a distinction between Generation Y (Gen Y) – often called millennials and represented in our sample by those aged 25–34 – and Generation Z (Gen Z), those born after the mid-1990s and aged 18–24.¹ The reason for this separation is that Gen Z are often thought of as digital natives with no memories of the pre-internet age. Gen Y, on the other hand, grew up at the turn of the millennium in a world without Facebook and YouTube.

Throughout this section we will combine our survey data with detailed qualitative data collected from young people in the UK and the US. This study, conducted by market research agency Flamingo, was based on tracking the news behaviour of a strategic sample of 20 participants over two weeks in January/February 2019, followed by in-depth interviews with them and their friends. The sample was made up of young people with different news habits, from a range of socio-economic backgrounds.

Primacy of the Smartphone

Data from both the survey and the qualitative research emphasise what we have known for some time – that young people are highly reliant on their phones. Our digital tracking in the US and UK shows that Gen Z and Gen Y spend a large part of their waking hours interacting with smartphones. They use them for communication, for media, for games, for dating – and for news. Across all markets, our survey data reveal that the smartphone is the main device used for accessing news for the vast majority of under 35s (69%).

Another way of illustrating the primacy of smartphone news for young people is to look at data on their first contact with news on a typical day.² Nearly half of Gen Z news users (45%) in our combined sample come into first contact with news in the morning via the smartphone, with only 19% via TV and 5% via desktops/laptops. Similar trends can be seen among Gen Y, who also first turn to their smartphone (39%) over TV (22%) or the computer (8%). By sharp contrast, for over 35s television is still the most likely first contact point with news (30%), with smartphone (19%) and radio (18%) some way behind.

We can also look in more depth at where people go when they first pick up their smartphones for news. While those over 35 are likely to first go directly to a news site via an app or the mobile browser (39%), Gen Z are more likely to turn to social media and messaging apps (57%). In other words, news brands are less important for this group than for over 35s. Gen Y are somewhere in the middle, with 43% getting their news via social media and messaging apps and 33% directly. Facebook is equally popular as a first destination with both groups, and Instagram has become more popular in the last few years as a first destination. Interestingly, Twitter is twice as popular with Gen Z users compared to Gen Y users. Direct traffic is relatively more important in the UK than in the US, partly due to the prominence of publishers like BBC and the Guardian.

Insights from the in-depth interviews in the UK and the US reveal similar patterns among young people:

The first thing I would do would be check social media, see if there’s anything on Facebook.

Courtney, Gen Z, US

In the morning, I’ll go to the BBC app. I will literally click on it, and I will go, ‘Right, okay, what’s happening?’

Chloe, Gen Y, UK

Moments of Consumption

Our qualitative research, which relied on tracking data and interviews with a group of 20 participants, identified four key moments of news consumption for young people: (i) dedicated moments where they give time to news (usually on evenings and weekends), (ii) a moment of update (usually in the mornings), (iii) time fillers (commuting or in a queue), and (iv) intercepted moments where they receive alerts from news organisations or messages from friends with news. Of course, not all young people use all four moments, but most did use some combination of these.

FOUR TYPICAL KEY NEWS MOMENTS FOR YOUNGER GROUPS

Social media, as one example, are important for keeping young people updated and for filling time, but are not an appropriate place for dedicated news consumption:

It’s kind of like being somewhere and seeing something in a far-off distance and being like ‘oh, what’s going on over there?’ and you go and see it on Twitter and then you let them take you somewhere …

Alex, 31–35, UK

Young news users also rely on news aggregators like Apple News, Flipboard, and Upday, particularly when they use news in ‘time filler’ moments or want to get a quick update about what is happening during intercepted moments (e.g. via a news alert). Aggregators are increasingly prominent on smartphones, where headline lists can be accessed by swiping left or right from the smartphone homescreen on many handsets. According to the interview findings, aggregators have two distinct audiences. Among engaged young users they are used to curate the news they want and exploit the diversity of sources. For more passive news users, using an aggregator is an easy way to browse around series of headlines.

If I’m somewhere where I don’t really have time to read a news story, I do rely on headlines. The fact that I have access so that I can look at in two seconds, because I’m not really supposed to be on my phone at work but if I can just pull it out, click one button to get to the Apple News story and the answer is right there for me.

Maggie, Gen Z, US

For Gen Z, and to a lesser extent Gen Y, the key appeal of these services is convenience. Both groups enjoy multitasking, and they want media to fit the device and networks where they spend their time.

Young People are Changing their Preferences around Social Media

Looking in more depth at the role of social media networks, we find significant differences between the groups, and also changes over time. Facebook is used slightly more by Gen Y (52%), while Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat are used significantly more by Gen Z news users than millennials or by users over 35.

[Facebook is] ancient. Like, a mum’s thing. I don’t really use it anymore.

Ellie, Gen Z, UK

We can also consider the amount of time that people spend on these platforms, and how it’s changing.

Our survey data suggest that most young people (and in particular those in Gen Z), spent a lot more time on Instagram this year compared to last. On the other hand, there was a decrease in time spent with Snapchat – something that might worry publishers who have invested heavily in the Discover news platform.

NET DIFFERENCE IN TIME SPENT WITH EACH SOCIAL NETWORK IN LAST YEAR BY UNDER 35S
All markets

However, while many publishers think of Instagram as ‘the platform’ to reach younger groups, young people themselves often do not see it as the right environment for news:

I don’t think I would follow them [news organisations] on Instagram. … When I go on Instagram my mindset is ‘I’m going to get information but it’s more related to entertainment.’

Richard, Gen Y, UK

Once again, understanding the expectations of different audiences and the ‘moments’ they are in will be critical for engagement with particular platforms.

Identifying with News Brands

What is the role of traditional news brands in this distributed ecology? Insights from our digital tracking of news users’ mobile consumption reiterate that news brands play a very small role in young people’s lives. Most smartphone time was taken up by social network apps, internet browsers, podcasts, mail, and movie/music streaming devices – followed by dating apps, maps, and transport applications. Young people have a very low threshold for apps that don’t provide a great experience, while they value services that are relevant and useful at all times. No news app was within the top 25 apps used by all the respondents in the study, whereas Instagram was the application found on almost all phones with the highest use in terms of daily minutes used.

HOW YOUNG PEOPLE SPEND TIME ON THEIR SMARTPHONES AND ROLE OF NEWS
Aggregated view across 20 respondents

This does not mean that traditional brands are not valued by young consumers. Most do have an ‘anchor news brand’ that they will turn to when a major story breaks and needs verifying – in our qualitative research study this was typically the BBC or Guardian in the UK, and CNN or the New York Times in the US. The choice of this brand is often heavily influenced by early parental influence but the format is almost always digital.

Tone, Agenda, and Formats

In our interviews, young people were often frustrated by the negativity of the news agenda, about sensationalism and about perceived agenda of the mainstream media. Sometimes they feel that the views and concerns of their generation – such as climate change and minority rights – are not properly represented. But equally they do not want traditional media to go away, dumb down, or radically change their style just to appeal to them. For instance, young people expressed dissatisfaction with the tone used by automated news bots built by traditional news brands:

– I don’t need the news to be my friend.

– No. (×2)

– It doesn’t need to tell me ‘Hey, you know what’s happening in India right now?’ It can just be like, ‘Hey, this is what’s happening in India.’

– Yes, exactly.

Chloe, Victoria, Monica, Gen Y friendship group interview, UK

On the other hand, they also expressed strong interest in news formats that were more visual and easier to consume than an 800-word article. Some said the lack of context or background was often a problem too, so visual explainers – like those pioneered by Vox – tested well; as did other kinds of visual and mobile storytelling including graphical storytelling from publishers like the Guardian and the BBC.

VISUAL FORMATS ARE PROVING POPULAR WITH YOUNGER AUDIENCES

Podcasts were strikingly popular with our young respondents, but the appeal of online news video was more mixed. Younger groups are more likely to use online video than older generations, with around 15% of 18–24s saying they prefer using it to text. Again, we find that Instagram is playing a central role in popularising news video. However, it should be noted even among Gen Z, the majority (58%) prefers text over video because of the control and flexibility that text still offers. Video is not the way to engage young people, rather it is one of many formats that can engage.

Implications for Publishers

Overall, we find differences between Gen Z and Gen Y as well as significant overlaps. Both groups have fully embraced digital media – albeit in slightly different ways, with Gen Y carrying a certain nostalgia for the physicality of older forms of media, and Gen Z apparently having little time for media that does not display well on a smartphone or does not meet their exacting requirement for relevance forged by Facebook, Netflix, and Spotify. Both groups understand the importance of traditional news brands, but tend to be less loyal than their parents – preferring to pick-and-mix from multiple outlets.

The increased reliance on social media and other algorithmically driven services – which we have documented for several years – highlights that these generations do not want to work hard for their news. This year’s qualitative study shows that they want news access to be easy, and entertaining – but they also want it to be authentic, fair, and meaningful. They certainly don’t want it to be dumbed down.

None of this makes it easy for publishers to define strategies that will keep these groups happy at the same time as satisfying more traditional audiences with stronger allegiances and patterns. To some extent new formats like podcasts and explainers may help bridge the divide but it seems unlikely that younger users will ever be persuaded to pursue a monogamous relationship with the news or to abandon their platform-based habits. All this suggests that working to identify ways to reach and monetise audiences on third-party platforms will become an increasingly important focus for industry.

A full report on the findings of the qualitative study in the UK and US will be published in September 2019 (in conjunction with Flamingo Research).

This year we dug a little deeper into people’s attitudes towards news media using a series of questions designed to explore how well they thought they were performing. More specifically, we asked people whether they think the news media fulfil their watchdog role (do the news media monitor and scrutinise political and business leaders?), whether the news media pick relevant subjects, whether they adopt the right tone (are they too negative?), whether they keep the people up to date, and – last – whether they help them understand current events.¹

These are all things that the news media generally strive to do well. Many journalists would likely see them as being at the very core of their professional mission – a mission that they would argue the news media delivers on uniquely well. But what does the public think?

News Media do Well at Keeping People Up to Date

In the Executive Summary we saw that, across all countries, most people agree that the news media keep them up to date with what’s happening (62%), and that they help them understand current events (51%). But we should keep in mind that there is a significant minority (10–15%) that completely disagree that the news media help them in this regard – and perhaps equally concerning, around one-third who neither agree nor disagree.

Evaluations of the media along other dimensions tend to be more negative. Under half (42%) agree with the proposition that the news media monitor and scrutinise the powerful, only 29% agree that the news media cover topics that are relevant to them, and just 16% think that the news media use the right tone. Four in ten (39%) think that the news media are too negative. However, it is important to point out that many people do not have a strong view about this, with almost half (44%) selecting neither agree nor disagree.

Attitudes in Different Countries

These aggregate numbers can hide large national differences. Below we use a series of radar charts to display the differences between two countries where respondents have relatively positive attitudes towards the news media (Finland and Canada), and two countries where people are much more negative (Greece and Hungary).

PROPORTION THAT AGREED WITH EACH ATTITUDE TOWARDS THE NEWS
Selected markets

The news media in my country:

In Finland and Canada, roughly half of respondents think that the media do a good job in monitoring powerful people and helping them understand news, whereas in Hungary only one-fifth of respondents (20%) think that the news media fulfil their watchdog role, and a third (33%) that they help them understand the news.

However, even among these edge cases, we find relatively similar attitudes towards the news media’s tone. Only 9% thinks that the news media uses the right tone (in terms of negativity) in Greece, compared to 25% in Finland.

Attitudes within Countries

We can also see differences between groups within countries. If we look at differences by education, in the UK and Germany we can see that those with higher levels of formal education are more likely to evaluate the news media positively along every dimension. Those with lower levels of education are, for example, significantly less likely to say that the news media cover topics that are relevant to them, suggesting that the news agenda is more geared towards the interests and needs of the more educated. This chimes with the criticism that the news media do a better job of catering for people who are most similar to the journalists themselves, and are less able to serve those groups that are less likely to be found in the newsroom.

PROPORTION THAT AGREED WITH EACH ATTITUDE TOWARDS THE NEWS BY EDUCATION
UK and Germany

We might also expect to see differences by age. Older people are arguably more likely to have been socialised with a more positive view of the news media, and with a stronger normative view about the importance of the role that the news media play within society. However, when it comes to age, although the over 35s in Germany do tend to rate the media slightly more positively, in the UK the differences are small.

PROPORTION THAT AGREED WITH EACH ATTITUDE TOWARDS THE NEWS BY AGE
UK and Germany

In the US, people’s evaluations are much more likely to be shaped by their political views – reflecting the highly politicised nature of attitudes towards the news media. As illustrated below, right-wing Americans evaluate the news media very negatively – even more negatively than in countries with low trust in the news like Hungary and Greece. Conversely, left-wing Americans are more positive towards the news media than high-trust countries like Finland and Canada. The most striking differences surround attitudes towards help with understanding: 65% on the left think that the news media do a good job in helping understand the news, whereas only 23% of right-wing Americans think the same.

PROPORTION THAT AGREED WITH EACH ATTITUDE TOWARDS THE NEWS BY POLITICAL LEANING
United States of America

The news media in my country:

The Association with Trust and Pay

As we alluded to at the start of this section, people’s evaluations of the news media matter because they might be linked to positive outcomes like trust in the news and willingness to pay for it.

Predictably, our study shows that those who think that the news media fulfil the basic functions examined in this section are more likely to trust the news. However, the impact of each role on trust varies considerably. Views on the tone of news coverage do not appear to influence trust very much: 48% of those who think that the news media use the appropriate tone say they trust the news, but this only drops to 43% among those who find the news too negative.

Other media attributes are very important for trust. The majority (58%) of those who agree that the news media do a good job in helping them understand what is going on in the world trust the news, while only 19% of those who disagree with the statement do so. Immediacy was also found to be highly correlated with trust. Those who believe that the news media do a good job in keeping them up to date with events tend to trust news (55%), while only 17% of those who disagree with the statement do so. Put simply, we find that people are more likely to trust the news if they feel it keeps them up to date with what’s happening, helps them understand it, and holds power to account.

Though the links between these evaluations and trust are sometimes quite strong, links with patterns of news use – such as paying for online news – tend to be weaker. Regardless of whether we consider people that have positive or negative evaluations of the media along these dimensions, the proportion that have paid for online news in the last year remains the same at around 15%. This suggests that evaluations of the news media are not necessarily important for people’s willingness to pay, and that this willingness is likely to be influenced by other factors.

The News Media’s Watchdog Role

We can also take a closer look at attitudes towards the watchdog role of the news media – whether they succeed in monitoring and scrutinising the powerful. As we have already seen, a majority of those who think that the news media fulfil their watchdog role trust the news (55%), whereas only about a quarter (28%) of those believing they do not fulfil this role say the same.

We find large variations in attitudes towards the media’s watchdog role country to country. In Brazil, South Africa, Poland, Norway, Finland, and Portugal, a majority agrees that the news media do indeed monitor and scrutinise powerful people. On the other hand, in Korea, Hungary, and Japan only about a fifth of respondents agree with that statement. In Japan, in particular, the press is seen as being too close to the government, with most coverage rarely deviating from the official line.

The other side of this is how journalists in different countries evaluate their own role as watchdogs. We compare our audience evaluations of the watchdog role with how journalists in different countries evaluate the importance of being a watchdog in the 2016 Worlds of Journalism Study.² We find that in countries like Germany or the UK, there are few discrepancies between how important journalists think being a watchdog is for their work, and how audiences see the news media’s performance as watchdogs.

However, we see large discrepancies in other countries. In Japan, 91% of journalists think that monitoring and scrutinising political leaders is important for their work, whereas only 17% of news users in Japan agree that the news media monitor and scrutinise powerful people and businesses. We further find large discrepancies in the US, where 86% of journalists consider being a watchdog important to their work, but only 45% of American news users think that the news media are fulfilling their watchdog role.

Our research shows that most people want some simple, basic things from the news media – to keep them up to date, help them understand what is going on, and keep an eye on those in a position of power. These are things that many journalists and news media would argue they are already doing, though our data suggest that there is still a significant gap to close in terms of public perception. Better transparency about journalistic processes might help, along with improved marketing of the important work journalists do.

Understanding the influence of the news media on people’s political attitudes is far from easy, and we should rarely expect to find straightforward causal links. Nonetheless, a useful first step is to build a better understanding of how different groups within society access news.

In this section we will explore whether people with populist attitudes in Europe and the US have different media habits to the rest of the population.¹ In particular, we will describe how they arrive at news, how they interact with it, and what outlets they rely on. We will also show how newer, more partisan, and alternative news outlets are carving out audiences from the gaps left by established news media.

Defining Populism

Inspired by recent cross-national research, we identified those with populist attitudes based on their belief in: (i) the existence of a ‘bad’ elite and the ‘virtuous’ people – two separate groups with competing interests, and (ii) the ultimate sovereignty of the will of the people (Pew Center 2018). We tapped the first dimension by asking people whether they agree (on a five-point scale ranging from ‘strongly disagree’ to ‘strongly agree’) that ‘most elected officials don’t care what people like me think’, and the second by asking whether ‘the people should be asked whenever important decisions are taken’. For the purposes of the analysis here, those that selected ‘tend to agree’ or ‘strongly agree’ for both of these statements were placed in the ‘populist attitudes’ group, with all other respondents placed in the ‘non-populist attitudes’ group.

People have different views about what populism is. Some argue that populism is nothing more than a style of communication. Others see populism as a ‘thin’ ideology, best understood in combination with more comprehensive belief systems such as left–right (Mudde 2004). We will turn to this later, but given that those with populist attitudes do appear to have distinct media habits that are relatively consistent across countries, we will proceed with this simple distinction for now.

Populist Attitudes in Different Countries

The proportion of the online population that agreed to both statements varies from country to country. Figures range from just under half in the Netherlands (49%), the UK (45%), Norway (49%), and Denmark (42%), to around three-quarters in Slovakia (71%), Greece (71%), Portugal (73%), and Croatia (77%). In the US, 54% of those surveyed agreed with both of the above statements.

This suggests that populist attitudes are less widespread in Northern and Western European countries than in Eastern and Southern Europe. In almost every country we analysed, populist attitudes are more common among those either in the older age groups, with lower incomes, or with lower levels of formal education.

Those with Populist Attitudes Prefer Television over Online News

Despite concern that the rise of populism is being driven by online media, when it comes to news, those with populist attitudes prefer offline news use – especially TV. Of those with populist attitudes 46% say that television is their main source of news, compared to 40% of those without. This preference is stronger for commercial television outlets, but weaker for public service broadcasters. Indeed, public service media have been a particular target for negative attacks from populists as their influence has grown in recent years (Cushion 2018).

Those with Populist Attitudes are Heavy Facebook News Users

Nonetheless, online news access is clearly important for those with populist attitudes, as well as for those without. If we drill deeper and look at the different ways people arrive at news online, we see many similarities between these groups – but also key differences. In Europe, directly accessing a branded website or app is the single most popular way of arriving at online news for those with populist attitudes (31%) and for those without (35%). However, those with populist attitudes have a stronger preference for social media (24% compared to 19%). In the US, social media ties with direct access as the main way of arriving at news for those with populist attitudes. There’s also no clear preference for direct access among those without populist attitudes.

The preference for social media among those with populist attitudes is largely due to a preference for Facebook. This group is more likely to use Facebook as a source of news, but no more likely to use other social networks like Twitter. Furthermore, our data also suggest that this gap may be growing. As a group, those with populist attitudes say they have started spending more time on Facebook in the past 12 months, whereas everyone else says they are spending less. This pattern makes sense if we think of Facebook as a network that primarily surfaces content based on the preferences of ordinary citizens, as opposed to Twitter, which many see as being dominated by elite voices, the established news media, and a relatively small and generally more privileged user base.

People with populist attitudes are also more likely to share and comment on news more when using social networks. Other studies have found that populist parties tend to be more active on Facebook – posting more, and generating more interactions with their content than established parties.² These trends could be combining to create a social media environment where populist ideas and perspectives are over-represented – however it is not possible to conclude this from our data alone. So far, there’s little evidence that the growth of populism is being primarily driven by the popularity of social media – but it may be the case that people’s discontent with the established media is prompting people to rely more on social media for news (Schulz 2019).

Populist Attitudes and News Outlet Selection

Our data also show that those with populist attitudes gravitate towards different news outlets, and thus have different news diets. If we take our cross-platform data (online use combined with offline use) from the UK as an example, we can see that some outlets are more widely used by those with populist attitudes than those without, and vice versa. People who hold populist views are significantly more likely to use ITV, the Mirror, the Express, and the Sun, but those without populist attitudes are more likely to rely on the FT, Channel 4, the Telegraph, the Times, the Guardian, and the BBC. Audiences for other brands – including the Mail and Sky – are roughly evenly split.

This pattern reflects a preference for commercial TV and tabloid newspapers among those with populist attitudes. Those without, on the other hand, seem to prefer broadsheet newspaper brands and public service media. Some digital-born sites like HuffPost and BuzzFeed tend to have news audiences that are fairly evenly split. Other outlets however – particularly those we have previously referred to as alternative or partisan outlets – are often favoured by those with populist views, in addition to having audiences with a heavy left–right skew.

It is also noticeable how populist preferences cut across left–right divides, highlighting new dimensions along which news audiences can be segmented. For example, those with populist attitudes exhibit a clear preference for both the right-leaning Sun and the left-leaning Mirror. Similarly, those without populist attitudes have a preference for both the Guardian and the Telegraph – two newspapers with very different editorial lines.

Populism and News Audience Polarisation

Given these different usage patterns, we might wonder whether news audiences are polarised according to populist attitudes. In other words, to what extent do those with populist attitudes consume news from one set of outlets, and those without from another?

In our 2017 report, we explored how individual left–right preferences created a large degree of news audience polarisation in some countries, but not in others. We saw that in US, the UK, and in Southern and Eastern Europe, audiences for news outlets are often heavily right- or left-leaning – with relatively few outlets able to attract people of different persuasions. Whereas in other countries – typically those in Western and Northern Europe – news outlets had mixed audiences made up centrists, those on the left, and those on the right.

In the charts below, we compare the degree to which countries have strong left- or right-leaning audiences, with the degree to which they have strong populist or non-populist audiences. In the UK and the US – as in most countries – the extent of left–right polarisation is greater than the level of populist polarisation. The UK – with its prominent tabloid press – is home to outlets with relatively large populist audiences, but given that some outlets have audiences with a higher proportion of left- or right-leaning people (indicated by their distance from the centre of the map), it’s arguably true that left–right preferences are more important to people when deciding what news outlets to use. This is even more so in the US, where the degree of left–right polarisation is particularly strong.

CROSS-PLATFORM AUDIENCE MAP
United Kingdom

United States of America

In Germany, we see a different pattern. Here, the level of populist news audience polarisation is broadly similar to the US and the UK, but because the degree of left–right polarisation is low due to a general reluctance from the German news media to adopt partisan positions, populist attitudes have become more important to people when deciding what outlets to use.

CROSS-PLATFORM AUDIENCE MAP
Germany

Mapping News Audiences along Two Dimensions

Although some assume populism to be closely aligned with the right, scholars tend to see populism as a thin ideology that can be combined with both left- and right-wing views. Within each country we can essentially merge the above maps to identify outlets with populist left or populist right audiences.

When we do this, a number of interesting patterns emerge. The position of each outlet along the horizontal axis indicates whether it has a left-leaning or right-leaning audience, with the distance from the centre indicating the strength of the skew. The position on the vertical axis indicates whether the outlet has a populist audience. The higher the outlet, the more its audience is skewed towards those with populist attitudes. Outlets with populist left audiences are coloured red, and outlets with populist-right audiences are coloured blue.

The US and the UK both contain a mixture of outlets with populist left and populist right audiences. The Mirror, for example, clearly has an audience that is predominantly made up of people who self-identify on the left, and who also hold populist attitudes. Readers of the Sun also tend to hold populist attitudes, but self-identify on the right.

In the US, though there are some outlets with populist audiences – such as Fox and HuffPost – it is also clear that the majority of outlets have audiences that are predominantly non-populist left, such as the New York Times. It is also clear that none of the outlets we examined in the US have audiences that are as skewed towards populists as in the UK. It may be that the inability or unwillingness of the established news media in the US to connect with those with populist attitudes has created a ‘populist vacuum’ – which may explain why many turn to social media and talk radio for news and information.

CROSS-PLATFORM AUDIENCE MAP
UK and USA

Not every country has this relatively even balance between populist left and populist right audiences. In Germany, we did not find any outlets with a populist left audience in our data. However, a considerable number of outlets have populist right audiences, particularly commercial television channels like Sat.1 and RTL. In Spain we see the opposite. Here, there are several outlets with populist left audiences, but only a handful on the right. It is perhaps no coincidence that Spain has also seen one of the strongest populist left political movements in recent years, though the populist right did well in 2019 elections.

CROSS-PLATFORM AUDIENCE MAP
Germany and Spain

The maps we have shown so far also contain partisan and alternative news websites – such as the Canary in the UK and Breitbart in the US. These outlets usually have very left- or right-leaning audiences, but as is clear from the maps, they often have very populist audiences as well. Breitbart has the most populist audience in our US dataset, and the Canary’s audience is also more likely to hold populist views.

Sweden contains some extreme examples of this phenomenon. Outlets like Fria Tider are used by around 10% of the online population, and have audiences that are heavily skewed towards those that both self-identify on the right and hold populist views. These outlets are sometimes understood as anti-immigration, but are also critical of political elites and the criminal justice system (Nygaard 2019). Their tone and style of coverage is a clear departure from the norms that govern the established television and newspaper outlets in Sweden.

CROSS-PLATFORM AUDIENCE MAP
Sweden

In France and Italy, perhaps the most notable feature of the maps is that the most popular outlets also have a higher than average number of people with populist attitudes in their audience. These are typically commercial television channels, again highlighting the link between populist attitudes and seeing TV as the main source of news.

We have not fully explored the links between populist attitudes and trust this year. But our data do show less of a trust gap between those with populist attitudes and those without populist attitudes in countries where the most popular news outlets have populist audiences. However, in countries where populist outlets are less prominent – often because public service media are dominant – populists are considerably less likely to think that they can trust most news most of the time. In short, people who do not find any news media that reflect their attitudes often trust all news media less.

CROSS-PLATFORM AUDIENCE MAP
France and Italy

It has become fashionable to dismiss left–right as an outdated concept that no longer explains people’s beliefs. But when it comes to news use, it is still able to explain a lot in both Europe and the US. Populism clearly matters too, but is best understood in combination with left–right self-identification.

A key question for publishers is how they will understand their own position within this two-dimensional space, especially as new partisan and alternative outlets carve out audiences from the spaces they have left vacant. A key question for public debate concerns what will happen if a significant minority is unable to find some, if any, established news outlets that reflect their attitudes, and instead turns to alternative and partisan outlets, and social media.