News perceptions among Flemish young people. How can news media win back young people?
This research focuses on news consumption and perceptions of young people aged between 16 and 26. More specifically, we examine their news moments. Research shows that traditional news formats of mainstream media are increasingly out of tune with young people's lifestyles. This is unfortunate, as established news media fulfil an important gatekeeping role and usually maintain high, journalistic standards, in terms of news gathering and reporting. This research wants to determine which news moments are important for these young people (but could possibly be filled in better or differently) and why (motivations, frustrations, ...).
Research shows that traditional news formats of mainstream media are increasingly out of touch with young people's lifestyles. This is unfortunate, because established news media fulfil an important gatekeeping role and usually maintain high, journalistic standards, in terms of news gathering and reporting.
It is important to re-engage young people with the news these media spread.
You can see the results of this survey on News moments of Flemish youth:
News moments. Pardon?
This research focuses on news consumption and perceptions of Flemish young people aged between 16 and 26. More specifically, we examine their news moments.
We define a news moment as "a moment, more or less defined in time and place, in which young people consume news".
Such a moment can be short (watching one Instagram story, for example) or long (watching one documentary on TV), and consist of a single news source or a succession of different news sources (such as "zapping" between apps, news on social media, videos, etc.). A news moment can be initiated from a clear intention to consult news, or be accidental. The young person is then offered news for instance through notifications or other "triggers" such as a meme on social media.
We call a news journey the chain of news sources that, within the same news moment, are "consumed" by a young person in a day, a week, ...
Breakfast time, on-the-go time, ...
The study aims to determine
- which news moments are important for these young people (but could possibly be filled in better or differently) and why (motivations, frustrations, ...)
- which (different) newsjourneys young people follow.
- which moments have potential to be filled with news or where mainstream media can pick up with their offerings or do better than they do today
Dates, diaries and so much more
To investigate news moments, we use four research methods
- Datalogging: using mobileDNA and from a tool developed within the NewsDNA research project
- Mobile diaries: questionnaire "pushed" to smartphone
- Focus interviews in which we explore news moments in depth
- An online questionnaire in which we test issues among a larger sample
The research is primarily a qualitative study, focusing on understanding young people's news consumption. The quantitative questioning (survey) is important to give an idea to what extent the findings from the qualitative research are representative of a large or small part of our target group (young people 16-26).
Relevant news for young people
We see this research as applied research that can help (news) media connect with young people. And all from the prior assumptions that they ...
- that band have been lost mainly for the benefit of social media and aggregators
- and that mainstream or legacy media have expertise and deontology that makes their newsgathering qualitatively superior and thus worth pushing to a young audience.
Meet the team
Work with us?
Request customised research
We are happy to help you formulate your research question-and approach.
