This study investigates the degree of news avoidance during the first months of the Covid-19 pandemic in the Netherlands. Based on two panel surveys conducted in the period April–June 2020, this study shows that the increased presence of this behavior, can be explained by negative emotions and feelings the news causes by citizens. Moreover, news avoidance indeed has a positive effect on perceived well-being. These findings point to an acting balance for individual news consumers. In a pandemic such as Covid-19 news consumers need to be informed, but avoiding news is sometimes necessary to stay mentally healthy.
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This article offers an overview of 94 scientific studies (published between 2006 and 2022) to examine how young people (ages 10–36) define, consume, and evaluate news. Research on news and youth has exploded over the past decades, but what can we conclude from it, and how should journalism scholars move forward? The systematic literature review reveals that while young people remain interested in news, how they consume it has changed drastically. Social media platforms and algorithms now play a pivotal role in young people’s news consumption. Moreover, due to the overwhelming nature of today’s high-choice digital media landscape, youth engage both actively and passively with news, while sometimes exhibiting avoidance tendencies. The review also demonstrates how the impact of digitalization has reshaped young people’s ability to critically evaluate the credibility of news, often relying on social networks and technology platforms. The review concludes with a research agenda.
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The number of people that intentionally avoid the news is growing. This could have several personal and societal implications. Previous research exposed various motives to avoid news, which lead to different manifestations of news avoidance, and consequently different implications. However, so far less is known about the differences in news avoidance types. In this study, we aim to explore different profiles of news avoiders beyond demographics, based on their motives to avoid news, values in life and personality traits. We analyze how this relates to background characteristics, the degree of news avoidance (occasional, regular, consistent), and news consumption. We rely on a survey conducted in The Netherlands (N = 2798) in March 2022. We conducted a Latent Profile Analysis and found seven news avoiders’ profiles: (1) interested occasional avoider; (2) emotive occasional avoider; (3) critical occasional avoider; (4) status-driven occasional avoider; (5) skeptical frequent avoider; (6) news outsider; and (7) convinced frequent avoider. This provides a nuanced picture of news avoidance.
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This paper will query whether a dedicated news platform can attune to young people’s civic needs? That is to ask: can this be a space that follows a social media logic of conversation and ‘give and take’ – with producers and consumers changing roles or even losing the distinction? How could and would such a news source be of interest to urban young, arguably the group that feels most removed from citizen status and social acceptance for who they happen to be? ‘Urban youth’ for us refers to a very specific group of young people. They are Marokko.nl’s community members. As the name suggests a fair number of them will consider themselves to be Moroccan-Dutch. From our perspective it is important to understand this group as identifying with ethnic minority groups in the Netherlands, although most of them will have been born in the Netherlands and hold Dutch citizenship. More than other young people they will recognize Islam as the religion they feel closest to. They also share a sense, as will become clear below, that they are caught ‘between two worlds’ (Elias and Lemish, 2008; Singla, 2004; Gezduci and D’Haenens, 2010). Mainstream Dutch media cast preciously few actors, anchors, audience members and experts from ethnic minority groups. Not surprisingly, this is often given as a reason to distrust hegemonic media and as underlining a sense of distance and alienation from Dutch society (see also Awad and Roth, 2011: 401).
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In recent years, the use of visualizations or infographics in the news has become increasingly popular. We know, however, surprisingly little about how news consumers use and appreciate news visualizations. We apply a mixed-method approach to answer these two questions. First, we conduct an eye-tracking study that measures use, by means of direct attention to visualizations on three different news platforms (print newspaper, e-newspaper on tablet, and news website). Second, we conduct focus groups and a survey among readers of three news media to study the extent to which news consumers actually value the inclusion of visualizations in the news. Our results show that news consumers do indeed read news visualizations, regardless of the platform on which the visual is published. We also find that visualizations are appreciated, but only if they are coherently integrated into a news story and thus fulfill a function that can be easily understood. With this study, we provide the first comprehensive picture of the usefulness of information visualizations in the news, and contribute to a growing literature on alternative ways of storytelling in journalism today.
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This report has been established within the Flexiheat project. Flexiheat has focused on increasing flexibility in district heating systems. The intelligent district heating network is a dynamic network: an open network where different waste heat and renewable energy sources are connected, that has multiple producers and groups of consumers and facilitates the connection between different energy infrastructures (gas, heat and electricity). Eventually this will lead to an optimal deployment of the available heat sources and an increased cost-efficiency of district heating. Flexiheat aims to develop new concepts for these intelligent, flexible district heating networks. One of the strategies is to allow third party access to the network. A smart control system is developed to manage the heat flows across the network. This system makes use of dynamic pricing. In this exploration the concept of third party access in relation to the Flexiheat project will be discussed. The development of new business and price models based on the Flexiheat approach has led to an analysis of possible alternative price models for consumers.
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In recent years, the use of visualizations or infographics in the news has become increasingly popular. We know, however, surprisingly little about how news consumers use and appreciate news visualizations. We apply a mixed-method approach to answer these two questions. First, we conduct an eye-tracking study that measures use, by means of direct attention to visualizations on three different news platforms (print newspaper, e-newspaper on tablet, and news website). Second, we conduct focus groups and a survey among readers of three news media to study the extent to which news consumers actually value the inclusion of visualizations in the news. Our results show that news consumers do indeed read news visualizations, regardless of the platform on which the visual is published. We also find that visualizations are appreciated, but only if they are coherently integrated into a news story and thus fulfill a function that can be easily understood. With this study, we provide the first comprehensive picture of the usefulness of information visualizations in the news, and contribute to a growing literature on alternative ways of storytelling in journalism today.
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Wereldwijd onderzoek: Hoe gebruiken nieuwsmedia social media? Jongeren lezen geen krant meer, ze kijken op hun smartphone die ze altijd bij de hand hebben. Binnen het lectoraat social media en reputatiemanagement van NHL hogeschool te Leeuwarden heeft een groep internationale studenten in 12 landen onderzoek gedaan. Hierbij hebben ze meer dan 150 social media sites bestudeerd van nieuws media. De resultaten maken deel uit van een internationaal onderzoek van NHL Hogeschool en Haaga Helia University. De onderzoeksvraag was: Wat speelt zich af in de nieuwsmedia? Persbureaus kunnen het overzicht gebruiken om hun social media te optimaliseren. En voor ieder die journalistiek een warm hart toedraagt is het interessante informatie over de nieuwsmedia in een overgangssituatie (2nd edition)
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Depicting news graphically is considered an apt way to deal with challenges of modern journalism: to disclose big data, and present news attractively, visually, and fast to grasp. This study delves into reported obstacles and challenges for the production of news visualizations. It focuses on the question: what are the decisive factors that make news visualizations ‘work’ for the different people involved: journalists, designers and the public? To answer the research question, a threefold approach was taken: a review of both pertinent professional literature and academic studies on the production process of infographics; in-depth interviews with data journalists on their most extensive productions; and case studies around the production of three Dutch media visualizations. Results show that the quality and the use of visualization for news stories not only depends on the availability and the skills of designers and data journalists, but even more so on the willingness of the editors-in-chief to initiate experiments with new concepts and tools and to opt for new ways of news gathering and dissemination.
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The purpose of this literature study is to obtain information about educational approaches to teaching 11 to 12 years old children focusing on how to distinguish between real news and fake news. With this purpose we studied 16 academic papers about learning activities to make primary school children media-literate and able to recognise fake news. What we found is that having children create their own news messages seems to be the most effective approach. News messages that they create can be text messages as well as videos, audios, pictures and animations. Based on this conclusion, students from The Hague University of Applied Sciences Teacher Training Institute (PABO) have been asked to develop a set of learning materials that can be used for instruction in primary schools. The effectiveness of those materials is currently being tested at an elementary school in Rijswijk. The results of the literature and the field study will be shared in the Dutch centre of expertise for media literacy education, Mediawijzer.net.
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