Reuters Institute Digital News Report 2022

FOCUS

Commissioned by the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, University of Oxford, United Kingdom, this report was published on June 15, 2022. It has been written by researchers at the Institute – Nic Newman, Dr Richard Fletcher, Dr Craig T. Robertson and Dr Kirsten Eddy – along with Prof. Rasmus Kleis Nielsen, the director of the Institute. The first Digital News Report was published in 2012 and this 2022 edition is the eleventh in the series. The report seeks to understand and track the consumption of news in different countries.

The report collected data from across six continents and 46 countries through an online questionnaire during January and February 2022. Due to this, the results of the report are more representative of the “online population” and “countries with high internet penetration”. This is especially true for countries like India where the data represents the younger, English-speaking demographic that could be reached through the online survey.

The report observes developments in different sectors such as digital, print and social media. It also looks at how young people (aged 18-24 years) access news. The study finds that, overall, interest in news as well as news consumption in general has declined considerably. Trust in news media has also reduced. Moreover, the report finds that the “cost-of-living crisis” is expected to affect how much people spend to access news.

This 163-page document is divided into four sections: Executive Summary and Key Findings (Section 1); Further Analysis and International Comparison (Section 2); Analysis by Country and Market (Section 3); and References (Section 4).

    FACTOIDS

  1. Across all markets, interest in news saw a significant drop from 63 per cent in 2017 to 51 per cent in 2022. Consumption of traditional media – like television and print – decreased further in almost all countries surveyed. News consumption online and on social media did not bridge the gap, the report states.

  2. According to the report, the proportion of consumers paying for online news content increased in a few rich countries such as Australia, Germany, and Sweden. However, across a collection of 20 countries where payment for news is relatively common, only 17 per cent paid for any online news in 2022 – same estimates as the previous year.

  3. Across all nations, 23 per cent of the population preferred to consume news through a website or app – a drop by nine percentage points from 2018.

  4. The average age of a digital news subscriber was almost 50 years, highlighting the challenge the industry faces in convincing the youth to pay. The report found that people aged 18-24 years instead preferred to consume news via social media, search engines and mobile aggregators.

  5. In India, as high as 72 per cent of the survey participants accessed news via smartphones and 35 per cent via computers. Consumers also accessed news via aggregator platforms and apps such as Google News (53 per cent), Dailyhunt (25 per cent), Inshorts (19 per cent) and NewsPoint (17 per cent). Such platforms have come to be valued for their convenience, the report states.

  6. According to Tuning into consumer report published by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) in March 2022, print media reported a growth in revenue of 20 per cent in 2021. Legacy media platforms, however, are facing fierce competition from digital media pursuing independent journalism. As per the same FICCI report, the digital media market grew by 29 per cent in 2021.

  7. The survey conducted for this Reuters report showed high popularity of YouTube (53 per cent) and WhatsApp (51 per cent) among Indian consumers for accessing news.

  8. The report, citing an article from The Print, states that the Indian government banned numerous YouTube news channels in April 2022 for spreading misinformation. The ban was carried out under the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021. The rules have been criticised by social media platforms as well as news publishers for promoting censorship and compromising user privacy.

  9. A survey conducted to find out the weekly reach of news – offline and online – showed Times of India, followed by NDTV 24x7 and India Today having the highest reach in the television, print and radio category.

  10. Among the various sources of news in India, online (including social media) was the most accessed with 84 per cent of survey respondents using it.

  11. The news trust score in India was recorded at 41 per cent. Legacy print brands and public broadcasters like Times of India (75 per cent), All India Radio (72 per cent) and DD News (71 per cent) were still highly trusted among the survey respondents. Various 24-hour television news channels and newer digital brands like The Print (61 per cent) and The Wire (57 per cent) enjoyed less trust.

  12. The 2022 report also looks at news coverage on climate change. It notes that audience interest in news about climate change is currently highest in some regions of Latin America, southern Europe and the Asia-Pacific. Moreover, across all markets, documentaries related to climate garner more attention than news covered by major news organisations.

  13. The report concludes that globally, interest in news is low and news avoidance has grown. Trust in news media has also seen a fall. It also finds that registration requirements and paywalls, though helping publications sustain themselves, are acting as barriers for people wanting to access news.


    Focus and Factoids by Priyanka Gulati.

AUTHOR

Nic Newman, Richard Fletcher, Craig T. Robertson, Kirsten Eddy and Rasmus Kleis Nielsen

COPYRIGHT

Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, University of Oxford, United Kingdom

PUBLICATION DATE

15 Jun, 2022

TAGS

#news #digital-news #news-consumption #social-media #news-channels

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