NYHETSUNDVIKANDE OCH POLITISKT SJÄLVFÖRTROENDE. En kvantitativ analys av sambandet mellan nyhetskonsumtion och politiskt självförtroende, baserad på befintliga enkätdata från SOMinstitutet år 2023

Abstract

Today, copious amounts of national and international news are only a click away. With the large-scale change in the media environment, we are witnessing a fundamental shift in the way we consume news. Even though traditional media is not completely dead, a large portion of it has been replaced by digital media platforms such as online news outlets, digital newspapers and social media. Even though these platforms provide an accessible and constant flow of news scholars have found that more and more people tend to avoid news, or at the very least, consume less. This change has puzzled scholars who through research have identified two main types of news avoidance: intentional avoidance based on negative emotional reactions to news and unintentional avoidance based on algorithms filtering out news or simply because other media content is more interesting. One of many variables that studies have found to impact the levels of news avoidance is internal political efficacy – one’s belief in their ability to understand and participate in politics. Others argue that the reasoning behind avoidance should be of secondary focus suggesting instead that focus should be on the fact that people consume low amounts of news, not why they do. Therefore, not many studies have focused on how news avoidance or levels of news consumption impact other parts of the individual’s perceived self – even though many scholars highlight the damaging risks of low news consumption to both the individual citizen and to democracy. Since internal political efficacy’s explanatory effects on news avoidance mainly has been studied in an international context and as a smaller part of broader studies on news avoidance, we wish to flip the relationship and analyze whether levels of news consumption can explain levels of internal political efficacy in a swedish context. In this study, levels of news consumption will act as an indicator on news avoidance, as some previous studies has measured it in that way. To achieve the purpose of our study, we formulated one main research question: What is the relationship between news consumption and internal political efficacy in a swedish context? We based our study on the theoretical framework of news avoidance. The theory is a suitable choice for this thesis since it brings clarity on why, how and when people choose to avoid news. In addition to the theoretical framework, we have also included previous research conducted on news avoidance, levels of news consumption and internal political efficacy. To answer the research question, we conducted a quantitative analysis based on existing data from the 2023 national SOM-survey constructed by the SOM-institute. The survey consisted of seven different forms, each answered by different people. In this study form number six was used as material for the analysis, it consisted of 58 questions, and it was answered by 1,752 people ranging from ages 16-90. The form included questions about both news consumption and internal political efficacy which is why it was selected as the material for this study. To analyze the relationship between our two variables we created two index scales, one for news consumption and one for internal political efficacy and then compared the two to one another. A high score on the news consumption index indicated high levels of news consumption while a high score on the internal political efficacy index indicated low levels of internal political efficacy. We also included age and gender as control variables to see if the studied relationship persisted when controlling for age and gender. The results show a statistically significant negative correlation between news consumption and internal political efficacy. Meaning that the respondents with low levels of news consumption also reported low levels of internal political efficacy. A conducted regression analysis also confirm that the relationship persists when controlling for age and gender. We also found that both women and younger individuals were overrepresented among the respondents who showed low levels of internal political efficacy, gender being the variable with a slightly stronger effect. Since the used data is cross-sectional no definitive causal conclusions can be drawn from the material. However, since strong implications was found, future research should consider moving forward with trying to assess whether the relationship is causal or not. It should also try to assess possible bidirectional effects. Our findings align with previous research on news avoidance and internal political efficacy but brings a unique contribute to the field by studying the relationship in a swedish context via consumption frequency instead of self-reported motives. We therefore have studied news avoidance as a habitual behavior rather than something intentional. Finding out how this behavior relates to individuals’ belief in their political capacity is crucial for many reasons – mainly democratic ones.