This just in: teens don’t give a crap about the news (especially of the local flavor), they are easy prey for catchy headlines (regardless of topic relevance) and topical news reminds teens that the world outside suburban developments can be dangerous…
Northwestern University has recently released a new study on the ‘online news experiences of teenagers that didn’t really come out with any mind-blowing findings, but it’s the recommendations from the study that are of interest, particularly to the news industry.
But first, the study found that there’s a significant difference between how teens and ‘professional journalists’ define what constitutes news. Music, entertainment, sports and even high school updates are more compelling news items to teens than articles regarding health, environment, politics and jobs. The study asserts that teens are not simply apathetic so much as they are hiding from the ‘perils of the world.’ The news makes them feel ‘unsafe’ and ‘threatened’.
That said, teens say they can become interested in stories they might have otherwise ignored as long as the story is packaged in a way that ‘catches their eye.’ Then their interest becomes quite involved as they use various Web tools (photo galleries, video clips, blogs) to dig deep into the stories they become invested in.
Now to the point of interest – this study presents several recommendations for journalists as ways to hook the teen audience. The researchers suggest excelling at music/celeb news, toning down the ‘negative’ aspects of news stories, creating an engaging (example: rate/rank/share stories) news experience for teens.
There was a time when a ‘one size fits all’ philosophy worked in journalism – but that era is all but completely antiquated. The current model is closer to an ‘ala carte’ model of journalism that completely makes sense given the capitalistic nature of Americans and sheer number of news Web sites floating around on the Internet.
Playing the part of ‘master of the blindingly obvious’ for a moment, it’s critical to cultivate today’s youth into “informed” news consumers. (Whatever that means – for our purposes, let’s just say ‘informed’ news consumers don’t survive by a journa-diet of celeb DUIs and hook-up rumors alone). So courting the incredibly tech-savvy Generation Z is critical for the journalists of the near future.
This could be done by networks/media outlets partnering with popular Web spots (the study says teens get most of their news from portals like Google or Yahoo) to develop news content targeted specifically for teens. The content could be selective to the day’s top stories, as well as the celeb/sports/entertainment news that teens just eat up. The teen-centric news site could prioritize their top stories to which story-types consistently pull in teen Web users – while subtly making them ‘informed’ news consumers. While teen consumers are reading about their favorite subjects, online editors could include links, sidebars, etc to more substantive news stories. This site would then become a gateway for teens who want more hard information or those whose curiosity leads them (intentionally or otherwise) toward hard news.
This could be considered ‘leading a horse to water’ way of going about news. It presents the news teens want, gives kids access to more in-depth ‘mature’ coverage if they want it or just allows teens to glean what they will at their own pace.
This conceptualized site is just one idea – and it would be very high maintenance. That said, it would be driven with the ideal of slowly molding teens into ‘informed’ news consumers.
This imaginary site would also counter the sites that would simply ‘fill in the void’ – sites that would be packed with ‘fun’ and ‘happy’ news without making ANY effort toward shaping young readers into knowledgeable.
This is all relevant to the ‘what is news’ discussion because doing the groundwork in educating young readers TODAY will ensure that legitimate and serious stories will not be buried TOMORROW by a public and editorial staff that had simply gotten used to supplanting ‘hard’ and ’scary’ stories in favor of Britney Spears’ inevitable demise.
Making zero effort on this front is conceding the battle for readership to the great number of bobble-headed Web sites (like TMZ) out there all to happy to fill teens heads with meaningless drivel and insignificant gossip pieces.
2 Comments
January 20, 2008 at 8:26 am
[...] frostfire wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerpt(Whatever that means – for our purposes, let’s just say ‘informed’ news consumers don’t survive by a journa-diet of celeb DUIs and hook-up rumors alone). So courting the incredibly tech-savvy Generation Z is critical for the journalists … [...]
February 17, 2008 at 9:05 am
interesting, thanks!