Measuring News Consumption in a Digital Era
As news outlets morph and multiply, both surveys and passive data collection tools face challenges.
Numbers, Facts and Trends Shaping Your World
As news outlets morph and multiply, both surveys and passive data collection tools face challenges.
U.S. adults in this group are less likely to get the facts right about COVID-19 and politics and more likely to hear some unproven claims.
Many U.S. news organizations are covering the coronavirus pandemic while themselves facing financial pressure from the outbreak.
In March 2020, about three-quarters (74%) of public Facebook posts about COVID-19 linked to news organizations, while just 1% linked to health and science sites.
Most Americans continue to get news on social media, even though many have concerns about its accuracy.
Today, 67% of U.S. adults get at least some news on social media. Twitter, YouTube and Snapchat serve as sources of news for more of their users, though Facebook still leads as a source of news for Americans.
About two-in-three U.S. adults say fake news stories cause a great deal of confusion about the basic facts of current issues. And nearly a quarter say they have ever shared completely made-up news.
A majority of Americans get news on social media, including 18% who do so often. News plays a varying role across the nine social networking sites studied.
Digital innovation has had a major impact on the public’s news habits. How have these changes shaped Americans’ appetite for and attitudes toward the news?
On cellphones, longer news stories get about twice the engaged time from readers as shorter pieces do. They also get roughly the same number of visitors.
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