ASNE - The Findings in Brief

A probe of the public's mind reveals a troubled image of journalism. The public's fundamental concerns about journalism, this research says, center on accuracy, the newspaper's relationship with its community, and perceptions that newspapers too often are biased and tend to over-cover sensational stories.

A thorough survey of journalists reveals areas of agreement with the public's assessment. Journalists agree with the public on the importance of accuracy - that it's more important to get a story right than to get it first. Most everyone - both journalists and the consumers of journalism - wants newspapers to present context and explanation, in addition to the facts.
But journalists and the public diverge in their views on some key issues:

The journalism credibility problem is defined by the areas where the public and the press agree about the problems, and also by the key points on which the public and the press judge press performance differently. The latter are the key "disconnects" between journalists and the public.
In brief, here are six lessons learned from this research.

1 The public and the press agree that there are too many factual errors and spelling or grammar mistakes in newspapers. Both put the major blame on deadline pressures.

Small errors undermine public confidence in the press, and the public finds lots of them in the paper. Journalists spot even more.

As far as the public is concerned, there's no excuse for errors. Journalists have a variety of explanations - mostly it's a matter of rushing to publish and being overworked.

Corrections are one remedy. When the public sees corrections in the newspaper, most feel better about the paper's credibility.

In the competition with television, the public believes that newspapers have higher standards of accuracy and are less profit-driven. The positive side for TV is that it has more immediacy in the public's mind.

But when the public faces conflicting reports on television and newspapers, it puzzles out the truth using common sense and logic. News consumers take into account which medium had more time to check out the facts and which was under deadline pressure to report what it knew at the time.

There is great skepticism among readers about unnamed sources. Nearly half of readers say a story shouldn't be published at all if no one will go "on the record." Newspapers have a public education opportunity here.

2 The public perceives that newspapers don't consistently demonstrate respect for, and knowledge of, their readers and communities. Journalists are much less critical of themselves.

Journalists are not a representative sample of the public. They are better educated and younger, their household incomes are often higher, and journalists are more likely to be political liberals than the public at large.

Nobody doubts that journalists are cynical, including the journalists themselves. But Americans also believe that journalists are quite willing to hurt people just to publish a story. Readers concede that journalists are better informed than the public. The newsroom agrees!

The public feels that newsroom values and practices are sometimes in conflict with their own priorities for their newspapers.

A healthy majority of the public shares the strong belief of newsroom people that journalists and the public at large share basic ethical/personal values.

But when journalists think, "Well, of course, we're willing to tone down our stories to avoid needlessly hurting people," the public shouts, "Baloney!"

3 The public suspects that the points of view and biases of journalists influence what stories are covered and how they are covered. While some journalists agree that particular people or groups sometimes get overly favorable (or unfavorable) coverage, they are less likely to perceive a problem of bias in newspapers.

All we want is fair play and neutrality, and please keep your opinions on the editorial page, Americans say. Don't kid us. We know that journalists write for their editors, not their readers. The public feels that advertisers and other people in power maneuver the press to get their viewpoint represented - at the expense of the non-powerful and underprivileged. The public believes that a major motivation for bias is commercial - to sell more papers or get better ratings. Indeed, a strong majority of Americans say the major concern of newspapers is to make money, not to serve the public interest. There's a good opportunity here for newspapers to explain themselves in this regard.

Political bias may not be as much a problem for the public as journalists think it is. Although a sizeable portion of the public (46 percent) thinks that their newspaper is more liberal than they, another significant segment (36 percent) see the newspaper as more conservative than themselves.

Americans offer journalists an element of forgiveness on the issue of bias, because the public understands and accepts that every person has a point of view. The public accepts the reality of personal perspective and point of view, and moves on.

The public believes television is more biased than newspapers. And most of those who see a bias in either medium don't view it as a major obstacle to being able to trust that news source.

Journalists don't believe the press is so easily manipulated. They see more shades of gray, and some think that newspapers are just an easy target. Others blame TV.

4 The public believes that newspapers over-cover sensational stories because they're exciting and they sell papers. They don't believe these stories deserve the attention and play they get. While most journalists dispute the charge, others argue they're just providing what readers want.

Americans say they are sick of sensational stories that grind on and on, and most of the newsroom admits to a degree of overplaying the hot, hot story. The public is virtually unanimous in believing that newspapers publish sensational stories to sell papers, not because it's important news. The newsroom vehemently disagrees.

More than three of every four Americans think that journalists actually enjoy chasing sensational stories. And there's a bit of suspicion in the newsroom that maybe papers are really chasing Pulitzer Prizes or overly aggressive reporters are trying to make a name for themselves.

The public says, "We're really not interested in these stories and you're giving us much too much."

Most of the public thinks a story should not run if only one side can be reached for comment, but less than half of the journalists agree.

5 The public feels that newsroom values and practices are sometimes in conflict with their own priorities for their newspapers. The journalists' responses suggest that they're correct in this view.

The public and journalists agree: newspapers should hold a story until the facts can be double-checked. The public values investigative reporting, withholding names of suspects until charges are filed, and overlooking long-ago amorous shenanigans of public officials.

And the public places a much higher value than do journalists on protecting the privacy of people in situations that most journalists would consider "news."

6 Members of the public who have had actual experience with the news process are the most critical of media credibility. The same is true of journalists who have been the subjects of news stories.

Americans based a large part of their views of journalism credibility on their personal experience, or that of their acquaintances, in being the subject of news stories, or their personal knowledge of situations reported in the press. Experience with the press is frequently negative.

Sizeable numbers of both journalists and members of the public say they found errors in articles about themselves or things they know from personal experience. Frequently, it's a matter of misinterpretation, but often a matter of factual mistakes.

Members the public and journalists who have been news subjects are more likely to notice errors, have harsher opinions of the media, and think that public discontent with the media is justified.