Numbers, Facts and Trends Shaping Your World
The overall quality of news coverage — including issues ranging from decreased accuracy to increased sensationalism — remains the most important problem area in journalism today, according to the press. But its relative seriousness has plummeted compared to the loss of credibility with the public. When asked about the validity of various criticisms of the […]
Members of the news media — particularly those in the newsroom — feel caught in a pressure cycle. Working journalists say that business pressures undermine quality, which hurts credibility, which in turn causes lost audiences. And that cycles back to added business pressure. Although there are striking differences between news media executives and newsroom journalists […]
A stream of candidate announcements and polls showing Texas Governor George W. Bush leading Vice President Al Gore have spurred interest in the 2000 presidential contest. But with the nominating conventions still more than 16 months away, what do these early polls mean for would-be nominees? A look back at nearly 40 years of early […]
Spike in National Mood The public’s sense of how well the country is doing has finally caught up with Americans’ positive ratings of their own lives. In fact, the national mood is better today than at any time since the 1960s, and the public is even more optimistic about the future. Nearly one-in-three Americans give […]
Introduction and Summary President Clinton’s impeachment trial has neither engaged the attention of the American public nor changed its mind about the continuance of his presidency. The public gives Clinton high marks for his job performance, expresses satisfaction with the state of the nation and registers even more contentment with their own lives than just […]
Survey Findings Pre-election polling is tricky work. A number of unknown factors can stand in the way of accurate predictions — problems with identifying registered and likely voters, uncertainties about voter turnout, and last-minute shifts in candidate preference. But estimating voter preferences in biracial elections has been especially difficult. Pre-election surveys, even those taken just […]
The public’s news interests help explain the relative resilience of these news sources. Crime, health and community — the focus of much of today’s local news — are the subjects that most interest Americans. The public expresses considerably less interest in news about political figures and events in Washington and international affairs — topics which […]
Introduction and Summary President Clinton’s lofty performance ratings are benefiting the Democratic Party, which is now in a stronger position with American voters than it has been for some time. In contrast, continuing negative perceptions of Republican congressional leaders are hamstringing the image of their party. By the biggest margin of the decade, the public […]
Not Much Going On… The public is unimpressed with the performance of the 105th Congress thus far. When asked to name the most important thing that has happened in the new Congress so far this year, fully 72% could not cite a single item. Those who responded gave a random assortment of legislative initiatives, led […]