Journalism as a Conversation

I cringed my way through most of this post on “Studies in Crap,” a column about outdated artifacts from bygone eras.  In this post, we’re looking at M. L. Stein’s optimistic Your Career In Journalism  published in 1965, with such gems as, “The journalist enjoys standing in his community. He is even likely to be held in awe” (p. 47). As we know, newspaper circulations were beginning their descent, civil and cultural revolutions were underway and voices of authority were soon under siege, including the mainstream press.

At least that’s how it appears. Even now with the Internet, arguably the most important agent of social change since the invention of television, it’s easy to think straight, just-the-facts journalism is an historical relic. The reality is more complicated. 

Esther Thorson and Margaret Duffy, best buddies and eminent professors at Missouri School of Journalism, created a model for understanding news consumption these days, the media choice model. In it they identify a variety of news “voices” people can choose from, including traditional (think Associated Press-style reporting) and “collaborative,”* the kind of journalist-citizen partnerships this blog is devoted to.

In one of my dissertation experiments, I compared both styles to each other on perceived credibility and expertise. I hypothesized that online news audiences would view collaborative stories (see example from experiment to the left) as more credible and expert because citizens helped the journalist tell a more complete, authentic story. Hardly earth-shaking predictions.

As it turned out, participants found both styles quite credible but equally so. In an earlier study that tested some of the same conversation variables, I found much the same. I’ve turned this issue over in my head a thousand times. I think it’s safe to say the traditional voice isn’t going away soon. Neither is the perception even among young online news audiences that traditional journalism — perhaps the kind mocked in good spirit in the “Studies in Crap” post above — is relatively trustworthy. 

When I speak to news leaders at conferences about these findings (The Poynter Institute and ASNE among them), I explain they’re straddling two worlds in this great Era of Transition: one that embraces the traditional and one the non-traditional, in the form of hefty citizen participation in the news.

I suspect collaborative news models ultimately will prevail as news organizations find richer and more meaningful ways for public participation, beyond the still-too-typical unmoderated story comments. (For a terrific look at innovative and inspiring examples of real-world conversation, check out Mark Briggs’ how-to online journalism book, Journalism Next).

Don’t write off the old-school stuff just yet, though. It’s worked for decades, afterall, and not just for egomaniacal reasons. 

* Unlike traditional stories with facts-laden, inverted-pyramid organization, collaborative stories here contained a preponderance of ordinary-citizen quotes, human-interest ledes, editor’s notes explaining in detail how the audience contributed to the reporting and several ways to reach the journalist for follow-up stories.