Not all bad news in blizzard of data, but our media needs to take a hard look at itself

Globally, TikTok has become the fastest growing social network. It reaches 40pc of 18- to 24-year-olds, with 15pc using the platform for news — increasing fivefold among this group over just three years. (Usage is much higher in parts of Latin America, Asia, and Africa than in the US or Northern Europe.)

For these important younger groups, social networks have steadily replaced news websites as their main source of news.

It is also reported that the smartphone has taken prime position as the first way most Irish people access news in the morning.

Despite this hunger for news, there is also strong evidence that selective news avoidance is growing over time: 42pc of the Irish sample say they often or sometimes avoid the news — up from 38pc in 2017. This trend is very strong in the young.

The report contains many other such insights into how the world gets its news. It paints a picture of a world changing at a bewildering pace — with huge differences quickly emerging within and between countries, and especially across generations.

These fast-moving developments are important to take on board, because of the role of news in influencing practically everything — from public opinion to government policies, as well as commercial trends and economic behaviour.

While initially disturbing to traditional print journalists, there are also strong grounds for hope, as well as for reflection and learning — for those prepared to admit these hard facts. 

Perhaps the most hopeful evidence is that younger people, while becoming wisely sceptical about news, also remain hungry to learn — admittedly through new media — while also having their feet on the ground as they pursue fun, entertainment and gossip — like any healthy 25-year-old.

Ireland, for instance, has the world’s highest level of podcast use (45pc), a tenth more than the US and nearly twice that of the UK. These ‘digital natives’ want to blend learning with fun, while also multi-tasking. Could podcasts be the new newspaper for people who don’t read newspapers? If so, we here have much to be hopeful about.

However, younger respondents also cite news as a trigger for anxiety or low mood — so they avoid it.

A significant proportion say they avoid news because they think it can’t be trusted. They take a particularly sceptical approach to all information, and often question the ‘agenda’ of purveyors of news.

In Ireland, 56pc trust most news most of the time — a high figure compared, say, to France, where only 27pc trust the news.

Around a third of respondents, particularly those who are under 35, say the news brings down their mood. Others say the news leads to arguments they would rather avoid, or to feelings of powerlessness.

Other previous studies have cited this ‘learned helplessness’ as a major factor in modern anxiety, going so far as to advise news avoidance for therapeutic reasons.

The report shows strong evidence of polarisation of media preferences in some countries — especially in the UK and the US, where there is almost no overlap of media consumption between left- and right-leaning readers.

The good news is that such media polarisation is not yet perceived to be a factor in Ireland. Most respondents here believe the main news outlets to be close together (62pc), which is higher than the EU average (51pc), North America (42pc), and the United Kingdom (35pc).

This difference is important and needs to be appreciated and preserved. The lessons from the UK and US are sobering. In those countries it is becoming increasingly obvious that a highly polarised and partisan media has played a major role in the dramatic deterioration of the functioning democracy — to a point where divisive economic and social impacts are starting to adversely affect every aspect of life.

The Reuters report is a veritable blizzard of well-researched data. But could this report itself be evidence of media’s biggest blind-spot? Could the choice of subjects that were examined be vivid evidence of increasing partisan and polarising campaigning — abandoning attempts at truth or objectivity, in favour of activism about virtue-signalling topics?

These topics are talked up by a combination of preachy alarmism and condescension toward those who might have other opinions — or worse, other facts. This is all accompanied by the emergence of a preaching media that has led to curated dramas — winding people up by exploiting the growing tribalism of identity politics.

The report devotes many pages to worthy discussion of reporting on climate — a favourite campaigning topic — but it is completely silent on other equally worthy and universal topics, such as reporting on media control, inflation, energy or housing.

This pattern of mistrust and alarmism is exactly what lies behind the great news turn-off that is the headline finding of this research.

The report contains much that could help to chart a new future for media. That future can only be realised by accepting and embracing the emerging evidence, especially about the habits and needs of the digital natives who will soon inherit this world.

This challenge is critical if we are not to lose all that is good in traditional journalism — objectivity, fact-checking, analysis, balance, and clarity. To do this, the media first needs to look at itself.