Americans Are Dialing Down Their News Consumption - Rob Horowitz

Americans Are Dialing Down Their News Consumption - Rob Horowitz

Americans aren’t tuning out, but they are dialing down their consumption of news. This is particularly the case for news delivered by what some call the legacy media— “local TV stations, most newspapers and public radio.”  These are among the findings of a new Pew Research Center media report.

 

The percentage of US adults who say they follow the news “most or all of the time” has dropped from 51% in 2016 to 38% in 2022. Correspondingly, “a rising share of Americans say they follow the news only now and then. While 12% of adults said this in 2016, that figure increased to 19% by 2022,” documents Pew.  Similarly, “while 5% of adults said in 2016 that they hardly ever follow the news, 9% said the same last year.”

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The decline in news consumption is across the board, cutting across all age groups, partisan affiliations, and ethnic and racial categories. It is particularly pronounced, however, among younger adults and self-identified Republicans.

 

This pulling back on news consumption and interest is fueled in large measure by a high level of news fatigue or exhaustion.  “About two-thirds of Americans (66%) feel worn out by the amount of news there is, while far fewer (32%) say they like the amount of news they are getting,” according to Pew Research Center surveys.

 

These public sentiments are most reflected in declines in news consumption in older media sectors.  Daily newspaper circulation—including digital subscriptions-- have dropped by 32% over the past 5 years or so, according to Pew.  For local and regional newspapers, it is now under 21 million nationwide.  An exception to this general trend is the top national newspapers, The Wall St. Journal and The New York Times, all of which, while continuing to lose print subscribers, have experienced robust digital growth.

 

Along the same lines, “overall, traffic to the most visited news websites – those with at least 10 million unique visitors per month in the fourth quarter of a given year – has declined over the past two years,” documents Pew.  And the amount of time per visit is also declining.

 

Similarly, the viewing of local television news has dropped significantly over the past six years. “For example, the average number of TVs tuning into ABC, CBS, NBC, and Fox affiliates for the evening news was just over 3 million in 2022, down from just over 4 million in 2016,” reports Pew.  There has been a less marked drop in radio listeners, including NPR listeners, but a drop, nonetheless. 

With a high-stakes presidential campaign just ahead of us, we may see some reversal of these trends.  But they should be concerning to anyone in the news business and those of us who care about the future of our democracy, which depends on an informed and active citizenry. 

 

The significant decline in interest in and consumption of news outlined by Pew is a wake-up call.  It shows the need for new thinking about how to deliver the news and, most importantly, on how news content can be more informative and relevant.  Given all the wrenching changes in the news industry due to new technology, these declines in audience and sense of disruption are understandable.

 

As Abraham Lincoln famously said, “As our case is new, so we must think anew and act anew.”