Mainstream news versus YouTube & Social Media
There is a sense that society has become increasingly divided in recent years. Whether it is traditional class divides, vaccinate vs vaccine sceptics, Labour vs Conservative, Brexit vs remain, woke vs traditional, pro-immigration vs anti-immigration, freedoms vs restrictions, capitalism vs socialism, climate concerned vs climate change sceptics, it seems that society have very different perspectives on facts and the truth.
It was our opinion that these divides were partly a consequence of (or at least exacerbated by) the differing news platforms that UK citizens access in order to form their views.
The following table provides insights into news platforms.
We asked respondents, 'which platforms, if any, do you ever use to read, hear or watch the news?'
| Gender | Age | ||||||
| All | Male | Female | 18-24 | 25-49 | 50-64 | 65+ | |
Mainstream TV and radio news channels (e.g. BBC, ITV, Channel 4, Sky News etc) |
81% |
82% |
79% |
66% |
73% |
86% |
93% |
Broadsheet newspapers – paper copies or online (e.g. The Guardian, The Times etc) |
26% |
30% |
23% |
20% |
21% |
30% |
33% |
Tabloid newspapers – paper copies or online (e.g. Daily Mirror, Daily Mail etc) |
27% |
28% |
27% |
19% |
25% |
29% |
33% |
YouTube |
24% |
27% |
21% |
53% |
32% |
16% |
7% |
Other social media (e.g. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram etc) |
40% |
36% |
45% |
59% |
51% |
32% |
22% |
Other news websites or apps |
35% |
39% |
32% |
20% |
31% |
45% |
40% |
None of the above |
5% |
4% |
6% |
8% |
7% |
3% |
2% |
Interesting results include:
- YouTube plays a role as a news platform for almost 1 in 4 people (and for adults under 25 this increases to over 1 in 2).
- Social media plays a role as a news platform by 40% of people (and this is over 50% for the under 50s)
- Mainstream TV and radio are losing their relevance as news platforms for younger people. Whilst only 1 in 15 people over 65 do not access news via this method, this reduces to only 1 in 3 for those under 25 years old.
- YouTube and Social Media can not be considered niche methods for access the news anymore.
An interesting point worth making is that in the world of social media and YouTube algorithms, information and news are increasing filtered to us based on our search history and cookies, and hence we are more likely to access opinions, perspectives and information that is tailored to us as individuals. Compared with mainstream TV, radio and newspapers, the perspectives are more likely to be establishment voices, aligned with the interests of media shareholders, corporate sponsors and politically motivated organisations and individuals. Both are fraught with issues - and the truth is increasingly difficult to find.
We took this question once step further in our survey and asked respondents, 'which platform is your MAIN source of news?'
| Gender | Age | ||||||
| All | Male | Female | 18-24 | 25-49 | 50-64 | 65+ | |
Mainstream TV and radio news channels (e.g. BBC, ITV, Channel 4, Sky News etc) |
59% |
60% |
58% |
41% |
50% |
64% |
74% |
Broadsheet newspapers – paper copies or online (e.g. The Guardian, The Times etc) |
7% |
8% |
6% |
4% |
6% |
7% |
10% |
Tabloid newspapers – paper copies or online (e.g. Daily Mirror, Daily Mail etc) |
5% |
4% |
5% |
3% |
5% |
4% |
5% |
YouTube |
4% |
5% |
3% |
16% |
5% |
1% |
0% |
Other social media (e.g. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram etc) |
12% |
8% |
15% |
18% |
6% |
2% |
1% |
Other news websites or apps |
13% |
14% |
12% |
10% |
14% |
18% |
9% |
None of the above |
1% |
1% |
1% |
1% |
2% |
0% |
0% |
Interesting results include:
- 71% of citizens consider mainstream news platforms (TV, radio, broadsheet and tabloid newspapers, including online) as their primary news channel.
- 29% consider non-mainstream news platforms as their primary news channel.
- This ratio is significantly different for the under 25s, where there is a slight majority (52%) in favour of the non-mainstream news platforms.
Does this present a challenge in UK society? Is this the root-cause of some of the problems we have been experiencing with social divides? Or is this enabling people to side-step political propaganda in their quest for the truth? Unfortunately we have more questions than we have answers for...
Note - We have further data overlaying socio-economic, household income, home ownership status, and other factors - if you are interested in us sharing more, please let us know.
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