Thread by @jbenton

New from me —>

No, Americans haven’t abandoned journalism values like transparency and oversight.

That study that seemed to say they had made some weird research design decisions that put a thumb on the scale.

(1/x)

niemanlab.org/2021/04/no-ame…

I'm talking about the study from @AmPress and @APNORC that said "only 11% of Americans" support five "core journalism values," including transparency, oversight, the importance of facts, and giving voice to the voiceless.

americanpressinstitute.org/publications/r…

You might have seen @Sulliview's column about it, headlined "Bad news for journalists: The public doesn’t share our values. But there’s hope."

washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/medi…

But the study's results are just...weird.

For instance, researchers asked people if they agree or disagree with this statement: "We need to put a spotlight on problems in society in order to solve them."

72% agreed, and only 6% disagreed.

They did the same with this statement: "It's important to offer a voice to the voiceless."

74% agreed, 4% disagreed.

"The powerful need to be monitored or they will be inclined to abuse their power."

70% agreed, 8% disagreed.

Those look like really strong public support for "core journalism values"!

72% to 6%, 74% to 4%, and 70% to 8%, all on the pro-journalism side.

But the report claims that

— only 46% of Americans actually support oversight
— only 50% support giving a voice to the less powerful, and
— only 29% support "casting a spotlight on a community's problems to solve them"

What?

Two big problems: One is some unfortunate survey design, which you can read about in my story (basically, a question structure suboptimal for the purpose it's being used for and a bad and arbitrary decision on how to define "support")

niemanlab.org/2021/04/no-ame…

The other is that...they never actually survey *journalists* to see how *they'd* answer the questions! They just assume that every journalist is 100% behind their somewhat tortured definitions of each value.

(They would not!)

Anyway, this made me cranky, because it doesn't in any way support the idea that only 10% or 20% of Americans "support" journalism or its core values, and yet that's how it was taken, both by people who like journalism and those who want to tear it down.

https://twitter.com/tedcruz/status/1382393742179586050

Also, I got to type out a phrase I've had in my head for a while now: "mistrust porn." /end

niemanlab.org/2021/04/no-ame…