Reuters Institute researchers receive major awards for work broadening understanding of trust in news

Members of our research team and former colleagues have been given prestigious awards for their work at one of the world’s biggest gatherings of communications researchers. Their work is an important contribution to how we understand and evaluate trust in news.

A team of researchers including current postdoctoral research fellow Amy Ross Arguedas and our director of research Richard Fletcher were presented with the 2025 Wolfgang Donsbach Outstanding Journal Article of the Year Award at the International Communications Association’s annual conference in Denver, USA. The award was for their paper ‘Ritual reinforcement: habit, emotion, and identity as attributes of trust in news’ published in Journalism Studies last year.

The paper looks at how trust in news is shaped by socio-cultural aspects such as news use habits, emotional connections to news, and personal or social identity. It suggests that those who are interested in building audience trust should look beyond politics and the professional practices in the industry to fully understand this dynamic.

Other authors of the paper include our former colleagues Camila Mont’Alverne and Benjamin Toff, as well as our former Director and Senior Research Associate Rasmus Nielsen. All were part of our Trust in News Project exploring this critical issue in Brazil, India, UK and US.

The award is one of the most prestigious in its field and is open only to those English-language works which “have made a substantial contribution to our understanding of the ever-changing role of journalism in societies.”

Lead author Ross Arguedas said: “I’m deeply honoured and grateful to receive this award with my co-authors from the Trust in News Project. It’s been a privilege to collaborate with such outstanding colleagues, and it means a great deal to have our peers recognise our work. From beginning to end, this project was a comparative and collaborative endeavour, and I hope this recognition helps highlight the value of this kind of research.”

Our postdoctoral research fellow Tali Aharoni was also presented with the 2025 Outstanding Dissertation in Journalism Studies Award for her work on how people experience trust in news across diverse cultures, platforms, and roles, from both audience and journalistic perspectives. Aharoni’s dissertation, "The Ecology of News (Dis)trust" draws on five of her studies, covering Argentina, Finland, France, Israel, Japan and the United States, to understand trust not only as an evaluation of news content, but as a relational and emotional process.

Aharoni said: "I’m truly honoured. This recognition highlights the importance of understanding trust in news not just as a question of content trustworthiness, but as a complex, culturally embedded experience shaped by technology, habits, and the lived realities of news consumption today. It’s especially meaningful to share this moment with Amy Ross-Arguedas and our colleagues from the Reuters Institute. I’m sincerely grateful to my advisor, Prof. Keren Tenenboim-Weinblatt, whose guidance has been instrumental throughout this journey."