1. POS: 3931 News Consumption and Soft News
Chase Meyer
Sep. 05, 2017

2. Today’s Agenda Announcements What gets covered in the news?
Which stories people read?
Who consumes news and what kind of news
Media consumption
Entertainment vs. News
Soft News

3. Announcements For next week read Boydstun chapters 3-5
Remember your response papers!
So about next week…

4. What Gets Covered in the News?
All news covers major events when they happen
Natural disaster, tragedy, election, scandal, etc...
But why is it that some stories stay in the news and on the front page longer?
Why do some seem to disappear over the matter of days? What causes the rise and fall of certain news stories?

5. Gun Control Example

6. Newtown Triggered Positive Feedback
Got a conversation going about gun control that did not stop

7. Chicken or the Egg?
Did people continuing to talk about gun control after Newtown cause the news to keep reporting on it?
Or did the news continuing to talk about gun control and the shooting cause people to continue the conversation?

8. Who Reads/Watches the News?
Before we determine what causes people to watch/read some news stories more than others we have to determine who watches/reads news in the first place
Consumers of news are usually more wealthy, more interested in politics/current events, more partisan... Similar to voters vs. non-voters

9. Who Did NOT Watch News in 2016?

10. Trust People will watch/read the news media they trust
Ideological component usually, but also basic trust in the institution

11. Who Consumes Media/Specific Stories
Those who consume media in the USA are generally wealthy, interested in politics/current events, non-white, young, voters, liberals, and partisans
The type of media they consume is the one they trust
With ideological component
But what about SPECIFIC stories? How do they stay in the news and remain consumed?

12. Proximity Proximity increases news coverage
US news will report far more on US events

13. Proximity Readers care about proximity
How does this effect ME?
Readers are far more likely to read news stories that they feel are more relevant and local
Localization of news results in greater readers/media consumers
How to localize stories?

14. Localizing Stories
People far more likely to read stories about the USA than about China – people far more likely to read stories about their hometown than the USA
Goal of journalists is to localize stories in some way
Can be difficult for national and international organizations
This is why many news stories are about individuals in the event being covered
People can relate to the individual and think, “Someone like this could be in my home town.”

15. Proximity/Localization
Stories that localize the news and cause readers to add personal relevance to the story
This not only results in more people reading/consuming the story, but also greater recollection/memory of the story
Some events though are so big they do not need to be localized
Ex: Sept. 11th

16. Good News or Bad News?
Negativity bias – our eyes and minds are more drawn to negative stories than positive ones
Why? Psychology has some theories:
We pay attention to bad news because we are overly optimistic at least at a subconscious level
We think that everything is great and rosy in our lives
Thus bad news is more of a “surprise”
In 2014 Russian news-website The City Reporter reported ONLY positive stories for 24 hours
Readership dropped by 2/3

17. Going Viral!

18. Going Viral!
What causes some stories to spread and “go viral” over other stories?
Positive stories more than “negative” stories, but must have the shock/surprise/anger/awe factor (even if it is negative/sad)
Study of NYT articles in November 2008
Backed up by study of NYT articles shared over a 3 month period in 2012
Criticism of these studies:
Lack political component
Done during height of election seasons!

19. What Makes Stories Stick?
Be local and have proximity to readers/consumers of news
Have shock/surprise/awe/anger
Generally be more bad news than good news
But avoid being very sad

20. What News Do People Consume? Broadcast
Average number of viewers of the Big 3 evening news shows

21. What News Do People Consume? Cable
Among the Cable News Channels

22. What News Do People Consume? Newspapers

23. What News Do People Consume? Newspapers
As of 2016

24. What News Do People Consume? Magazines

25. What News Do People Consume? Magazines

26. What News Do People Consume? Websites

27. What News Do People Consume? Social media

28. What News Do People Consume? Social media

29. Thoughts on News/Media Consumption?
Notice how many more people go to non-news sites and read non-news magazines?
Is this good or bad? Do we want more people to pay attention and learn more from the news?

30. Let’s Debate: Entertainment vs. News?

31. Solution: Soft News
Non-news stories/sources can still inform readers

32. Soft News vs. Hard News
Hard News is your traditional news outlets that focus exclusively on the news: CNN, ABC News, etc...
Soft News is untraditional and their first job is to entertain, but you still learn more about the topics/issues than not reading any news at all
Baum (University of Chicago) 2002

33. Soft News

34. Soft News

35. The Oprah Effect
Baum 2006 – soft news does more than educate it, it helps you vote “better” or “consistently”

36. Politicians and Soft News

37. Politicians on Soft News
But WHICH soft news shows should politicians appear on?
Brewer and Coa (2006) looked at which appearences resulted in viewers learning more about the 2004 primary campaign
Result? Comedy and Late Night better than Day Time

38. Soft News Come for the jokes leave with the political knowledge?

39. The Colbert Bump

40. The Colbert Bump https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LHInZUyUiPw
Fowler 2008 – its true!
At least for Democrats
Both in % change
And donation amount

41. Any Questions?
You, what’s your question?