An interesting new study from Pew Research finds that younger Americans significantly prefer to read the news, generally online, than watch it on television. According to the study, 42% of 18-29 year-olds and 40% of 30-39 year-olds prefer reading the news when possible – dropping to under 30% for people over 50.
While there’s a huge rush towards video or multimedia content over text – and posts and ads with images or video do tend to see stronger results in terms of social engagements and clicks than other performing better – there appear to be some contexts where people prefer to read information rather than watching someone tell them about it. In fact, watching silent videos is becoming more common on social networks, and these videos are incorporating more text.
I’d go beyond the research to wonder if this is associated with the high rate of news shared on mobile devices and on social platforms. For many older Americans, watching the news was a communal activity and shows like 60 Minutes or Good Morning America tended to be on at times when people would already be sitting at home over a meal or would be able to watch it while doing other activities like getting ready for work or preparing dinner. It could be consumed without disrupting their routine. Now, the internet has liberated people to consume news in the background all day long, catching snippets here and there on their smartphones as the latest developments are shared by friends to social channels. Even long-form news has become relatively easy to read as a link from Twitter or Facebook. This growth of at-a-glance news consumption anywhere, anytime has made scannable text a preferred news method.
Similarly, the rise of cord-cutting, with more than 1.1 million Americans getting rid of their cable TV in 2015, has likely meant that fewer and fewer people under 50 have regular access to a TV or have the TV running in the background as a passive source of news.
While print journalism has been struggling for years, with a 7% weekday circulation drop in 2016, it will be interesting to see if TV news will be impacted by this apparent trend towards reading the news online.
Images from the author’s collection and from Pew Research.