Our podcast: Digital News Report 2024. Episode 6: How audiences think about trust in news

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In this final episode of our Digital News Report 2024 series, we look at a complex and often controversial subject which is trust in news. We look at what trust in news means, how this varies by different audiences and socio-economic status, and what factors drive trust in news.

Speakers

Rasmus Nielsen is co-author of the Digital News Report, Director of the Reuters Institute and Professor of Political Communication at the University of Oxford. His work focuses on changes in the news media, political communication, and the role of digital technologies in both.

Our host Federica Cherubini is Director of Leadership Development at the Reuters Institute. She is an expert in newsroom operations and organisational change, with more than ten years of experience spanning major publishers, research institutes and editorial networks around the world.

Transcript

What 'trust in news' means | Levels of trust in news by demographics | What factors drive trust in news | Political views and trust in news | How news organisations might earn trust

What 'trust in news' means ↑

Federica: So let's start really with the basics. What specifically are we researching when researching trust in news?

Rasmus: I mean, the way that social sciences think about trust is that it's a sense that you can count on something to do what it claims to do and what you expect it to do. If you knew for certain that the entity in question would do it, you wouldn't need to trust it. You knew. You had certainty. And it's therefore also important to recognise that trust and trustworthiness is not the same thing. Trust is a belief that things are a certain way. And whether they are or are not, in fact, like that is a separate question and one that will require a different approach and one in which journalism, there really isn't a consensus on the objective way to measure trustworthiness. So others are working on that. But we are working on trust as a social fact, as a feature of society, as something that influences how the public relates to news.

We know this from much research, that trust is one of the factors that informs which outlets people rely on. It's one of the factors that influence what people make of the information that they see. And it's one of the factors that influence the degree to which news media can help people be more resilient to misinformation and false claims. So social scientists know that trust matters. And we know from our conversations with industry partners, that many of working journalists care about trust, and many editors and news media executives care about it, as well. So it's an integral part of the Digital News Report.

At a very basic level, I mean, I think it's kind of obvious why trust is important when it comes to news. If you think about this from the point of view of a member of the public almost all news reporting implicitly asks people to trust it. At a very basic level, if a news article includes sources, then it's asking people to trust that the reporter did, in fact, talk to those sources, and that they really did say what they're quoted as having said. And that the data that the article relies on is in fact reliable. And in a broader sense, news organisations and journalists are also genuinely asking people to have confidence in their editorial judgement in terms of what they cover, who they talk to, and what data they rely on, and that they're upfront and honest about their motivations. So trust is not the only thing that matters for news. But it's certainly a thing that matters for news and one we know that many journalists and news media care about so it's one that we research in the Digital News Report.

Federica: And what is the key question you ask to determine people’s trust in news, and what is the overall level of trust across all markets, so we can have a baseline for looking at this and how it varies.

Rasmus: So there are many different ways in which social science researchers can approach this issue. But the approach that we have taken is one that looks both at what is called a generalised trust, so trust in a wider range of different actors in society of which people may not have personal experience with all of them, and what's called particularised trust. So trust that is more based on a specific trustee at the at the end of that relationship. In the research, the top line question that we asked to get a generalised trust, is that we asked all respondents whether they agree with the following statement, ‘I think you can trust most news most of the time’. And then we code it into people who say they disagree with that statement, they’re people we believe who distrust the news, those in the middle and then those who say they agree with the statement as those who trust the news. This is generalised trust in news and we have a set of sub questions we've used from time to time. Do people trust the news that they themselves consume that tend to be a bit higher? People trust news that they find via search engine that tend to be a bit lower. Do they trust news they see on social media that tend to be lower still. But we also ask a set of particularised questions, where for a sample of brands, we can cover everyone. So a sample of brands, we ask people how trustworthy they regard an individual news brand as being. So we try to get both at the generalised level of trust and news in the society and amongst different groups, but also people's perception of individual brands.

Levels of trust in news by demographics ↑

Federica: And what is the overall level of trust across all markets in this year's report?

Rasmus: So the percentage who say that they tend to agree or strongly agree with the idea that you can trust most news, most of the time is 40% this year, that's the same as last year. So in one sense, I suppose there is good news for the industry here and that the figure hasn't declined further. We have seen a decline over time and in many markets. But it's also the case that it is less than half the public who feel that they, on balance, can have generalized trust in the news.

Federica: Do things like age or education matter in how the trust level varies?

Rasmus: I think that is a very important to highlight. I mean, there are many factors that influence trust. This is not a sort of a monocultural phenomenon, or a single sort of determining factor that drives people's perception of the news in general or individual brands. But I do think that sometimes in the profession, we tend to be mostly interested in very visible factors such as politics, populism and partisanship and the like, and maybe pay less attention to more basic issues such as age or income and education. And what we show in our research is that generally, across the 47 markets we cover, is that younger people tend to trust the news less. People with low income tend to trust the news less, and people with lower levels of formal education tend to trust the news less. And while it's hard to prove this, and of course, isn't demonstrably the case in every country in every case, I think, as a general observation, it's also fair to say that these are groups that are often less well served by the news media than older people, more affluent people and people with high levels of formal education. So perhaps there is something meaningful going on here, when these groups are less likely to say that they trust the news.

What factors drive trust in news ↑

Federica: In the chapter, you not only ask whether people trust the news, but you also ask why they might trust the news. Can you outline some of the factors you asked participants about and why?

Rasmus: Every journalist and news organisation needs to make their own decisions about how important trust is for them, why they care about trust, and who they might desire to be trusted by and what decisions they're willing to make to do that. But we do know that many journalists and editors would like to earn and maintain a higher level of trust than they feel they have right now. So what we did this year in the report is that we identified some factors that we know from conversations with journalists and editors and various nonprofits such as the Trust Project and others who work in this space that practitioners are very interested in and also some factors that social science has identified as important correlates of trust in news. And the list includes whether people think a certain brand has, or the news media have, high journalistic standards, whether they feel that they are transparent about how the news is made, whether they are biased, whether they represent people like me fairly, but also other things, ‘Are they too negative?’, ‘Do they exaggerate or sensationalise?’, ‘Do they have the same values as me?’, ‘Do they have a long history?’ Now, I want to be very clear that that not all of these factors are necessarily aligned with trustworthiness but as I’ve said what we're trying to understand here is trust as a social fact. And people's own perception of what factors might engender trust in specific news outlets so that news organisations who are interested in this can think about how they might demonstrate and communicate their commitment to things that matter for those parts of the public that they want to be trusted by.

Federica: Is any of these factors that you mentioned most frequently and identified as most important?

Rasmus: I mean, I think the challenge with this kind of research is often that everything matters, at least for some people. And many things matter for most individuals in how they make up their mind about whether they think an outlet is trustworthy. So almost all of these factors are quite widely identified as important. But there are important differences when you look across them. So, in most countries, transparency behind how the news is made, is very widely identified as important. Well over 70% in many markets. These are issues both about concerns about reporting about business models, about ownership. You also have a very large number of people who identify ‘high journalistic standards’, which often has to do with accuracy, factual accuracy and reporting, hearing the other side, professional judgement about which sources to rely upon, then ‘representing people like me fairly’ is very important, people want the newest media to give people a fair shake, and this is particularly keenly felt for themselves. And aligned with that is the very large number of people who say that they are very focused on whether they think a news organisation is biased, or at least upfront and honest about whatever editorial values or principles that may inform the way in which they frame the news of the day.

Federica: As before when we looked at things like demographics, or age or income having an impact on the overall level of trust, are these factors influenced by some of these, you know, age, income and demographics.

Rasmus: Yeah, it's interesting, because as I said, we do find that these very basic socio-economic status indicators that influence almost everything that social scientists study, they do influence people's overall level of trust in the news, but they seem to play a much smaller role in shaping people's thinking about which factors matter for which outlets they trust. So looking across age and gender, for example, there just aren't that many significant differences. And what that suggests to us is that even though people will come to different conclusions about how trustworthy they regard the news, in general, as being, let alone how trustworthy they regard individual news outlets as being, they tend to draw on broadly shared norms around what they expect from the news and want from the news. And these broadly shared norms focus on transparency on standards of reporting practices, on fairness, and on freedom from bias.

Political views and trust in news ↑

Federica: You mentioned before polarisation and political orientation is being one of a one of the factors that has an on trust news. How did you go about understanding this? And why is it important? Politics is, after all, just one aspect of people's identity.

Rasmus: Yeah, I mean, we should never exaggerate how central politics is to most people's way of being in the world or how they orient themselves. That said, I think it's very clear that there are some countries right now, the United States is but one example, there are many others who are living through pretty polarised moments in in their political history, even as other countries are less so. And that sometimes, some parts of the political spectrum, and some political actors are actively trying to weaponise attacks on the press for their own purposes, or are much more hostile to independent journalist trying to hold power to account. So we wanted to understand better the relationship between people's political orientation and how they think about trust in news. We rely on a sort of basic scale where we ask people to place themselves politically on a on a sort of range going from the left to the right, with a centre position as well.

And the interesting thing is that while it's very clear in some countries that political partisanship has really sunk in and began to influence people's relationship with the news - In the United States, people on the right are much less likely to say that they trust the news, though, interestingly, the pattern is the opposite in the UK, where it tends to be people on the left who are more skeptical of the news - that even though in some countries this is clearly very important, when we look across all the countries, on average, actually, there just aren't that big differences when it comes to people's political orientation, whether they're on the left in the centre or on the right. But what we can document is something I think is sometimes overlooked, which is that what political scientists called the other divide, so not the divide between the left and the right but the divide between those who are highly engaged with politics and those who are pretty distant from it or even alienated from it, really matters when it comes to trust. So people who respond ‘don't know’, when we asked them where they stand politically, this is a large group, it's about a fifth of the public, are both less likely to say they trust the news. They are also less likely to identify any of the factors that we asked them about as important for which outlets to trust. So they come across in our research as being distant from politics, yes, but also quite distant from the news. They’re not hostile exactly but they do seem indifferent and unsure as to how to even begin to think about which outlets they might trust when it comes to news.

Federica: If we stay on the level of interest in politics that people declare to have, how does this correlate with how people think about news and trust beyond this group that says, ‘I don't know’.

Rasmus: I mean, political interest and news use is slightly tied. And so is a political interest and trust in the news. And I think it does help capture a situation in which those parts of the public who are very engaged with politics as usual, the sort of actually existing sort of electoral process and the parties that compete for power there and who position themselve and contest to take government. They also often are pretty engaged with the news and pretty appreciative of the way in which news is currently produced. But much of the public is not that interested in the news. And they are more distant from it. And sometimes they will confuse journalism and news media with a political world that they feel is quite distant from them, and perhaps even not aligned with the public interest or let alone their own.

How news organisations might earn trust ↑

Federica: Taking a step back. In this podcast series, we often ask guests to share some lessons that news media can take away from the findings that we've discussed. And given many news outlets either have a wide reach or influence or are commercially successful or do undoubtedly valuable work despite possibly having relatively low overall trust scores, do you think increasing trust should be or is a goal for many news organisations.

Rasmus: I mean, I have an iron rule in my work was that, which is that I never tell other people how to do their work, I think it's presumptuous to sit in  a nice office in Oxford, and tell journalists and editors across the world what they should be doing, I think that's up to them just as it is up to members of the public to decide how to live their lives and form their own judgments of the work of others. I think what research can do is it can help those who care about trust, understand better, what the dynamics around trust are, what some of the factors influencing trust are, and think through their own approach to this issue.

So for example, I think a news organisation can ask itself of all the different things that we aspire to do - seek truth and report it, hold power to account, afflict the comfortable and comfort the afflicted, you can name any number of things that a news organisation could aspire to do, how important is trust on that list of priorities? Which things are more important, for example, holding powerful people to account will often make their supporters quite unhappy with an outlet? So how important is trust for us and which things are more important than trust? And if trust is important, then I think it's important to think about, is it important intrinsically in the sense that it strengthens the connection between a brand and part of the public and help people count more on that information, rely more upon it, use it more as they navigate their lives? Or is it an instrumental matter? I mean, there are news organisations who are increasingly oriented towards reader revenue. And some of those organisations been pretty explicit that they regard trust as a possible driver of subscription revenue, membership, donations and other things that benefit the organisation. So is trust an end in itself? Or is it a means towards other ends?

And finally, if trust is a priority, and if you regard trust either as intrinsically valuable and useful, who is it that you want to be trusted by? Is it your current audience and people like them, or are you trying to reach beyond that part of the public to earn and maintain trust with people who aren't currently engaging with your journalism which may require a different approach from that that may speak to your existing audience?

Federica: And in following up on this specifically, you know, for those organisations who do consider trust paramount. Do you think there is any major learnings from this year’s survey results they should keep an eye on? And while they craft their own strategies?

Rasmus: I think sort of maybe sort of two big things and one little thing. I think the first big thing is to be very clear that much of the public demonstrably want things from news media and journalism that many news media and journalists would like to offer them. They want transparency about how the news is made. They want news organisations to be committed to high standards of accuracy and hearing the other side and thorough reporting. They want news organisations to be free from bias, or at least honest about their editorial line. And they want news organisations who represent people fairly. These are things much of the public desires from journalism. And I think there are things that many journalists would like to offer the public. So I think there is a common ground here, which is encouraging. And this could be very different. There is a world in which people want entirely different things from journalism than those that journalists would like to offer, that will be a much more challenging environment, things are hard enough as they are, but that will be much more challenging. So that's the first thing, it’s to sort of recognise that there seems to be a pretty broad base shared sense of what people want from news and its overlaps pretty heavily with what many news organisations would like to offer them.

The second thing is, again, to try to be as specific as possible about why a news organisation cares about trust, how important that is relative to other priorities, some of which may well be more important - trust is not the only or even always a meaningful indicator of how well things are going. We had Carlos Fernando Chamorro from Confidencial in Nicaragua give the Reuters Memorial Lecture last year here in Oxford. There are of course many Sandinista regime supporters in Nicaragua who are not going to trust his journalism and overcoming that distrust is not necessarily the most important thing that they can do with limited resources and in a difficult environment.

So organisations can draw strength from this common sense of what matters in journalism, but also need to be clear about who is it we want to be trusted by and what are we willing to do to try to earn and maintain their trust, these are the two big things. And then perhaps a little thing, which is just to say that, if sometimes journalists find our research, interesting and relevant enough to cover it as news, which of course is very gratifying for us, if a piece of research explicitly says that something is not to be treated as the most trusted or least trusted outlets, it's kind of a bad look to brag about how you're number one, you're number one, when the report clearly says that that is not the way in which this work can be used. So that's a little thing that I would just suggest.

Federica: Thank you so much, Rasmus, for joining us today and for helping us understand a complicated matter much better. Thank you again.

Rasmus: Thanks Federica.

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