Trust in Journalism in the Structural Change of Media

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Wolfgang Schweiger
• Subject Area: Communication Sciences
• Term: from 2016 to 2022
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 318674777

The audience´s trust in journalism is essential for a functioning democratic public. This underscores the relevance of current empirical findings of a growing media skepticism in many democratic countries, including Germany and the US. Simultaneously, a structural change of media and public communication can be observed. Thes includes, among others, the multiplication of information sources - many of them non-journalistic -, changing news selection and reception routines among citizens, their increased participation in public debates (e.g. in user comments), as well as the changing role of journalism. The question of how the two phenomena - decreasing trust in journalism and the structural change of media - are related, has so far been little explored. This is the starting point of the proposed project. Based on communication theories and findings and with recourse to the theory of expectation-experience-discrepancies, a model is proposed what helps explaining how individual trust or mistrust in journalism evolves. At the same time, central media and audience related factors are identified and combined to research questions. Using a multi-method approach, the research questions can are answered and the model can be empirically tested and refined. Three closely related sub-studies are planned: 1. In n = 20 qualitative interviews with Internet users, relevant constructs and assumed effects are explored from the recipient view. Interviews focus on identifying recipients´ most relevant expectations and experiences concerning journalism and measuring trust in journalism as it is posited in the discrepancy-model. 2. In an online representative survey of n = 2000 Internet users, all recipient-side constructs of the model are surveyed: These are the most widely used information sources and contents, all journalism-related expectations and perceptions, trust in journalism and recipient characteristics. 3. In a media content analysis, German information sources in radio, print and online media including user comments are quantitatively measured. In addition, Facebook posts of publicly relevant actors are analyzed. The investigation period covers the month prior to the representative survey. This approach enables us to individually link the analyzed media and social media contents with those respondents who know and use them. In sum, the proposed method combination can register all media and audience constructs and relate them to the individual development of trust or mistrust in journalism.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants