Newspapers and political participation: The relationship between ballot rolloff and local newspaper circulation

Chapp, Christopher B.; Aehl, Peter

doi:10.1177/07395329211014968

Cited by 4 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 48 publications

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“…While there are a few studies that address the intentions and approaches of local journalists, what is consistent is the connection they have to their communities as they chose to rally around issues pertinent to that community (Radcliffe, 2017). Local newspapers in particular play a significant role in informing voters (Druckman, 2005), and newspaper circulation per capita can influence whether someone will vote down-ballot (Chapp & Aehl, 2021).…”

Section: Local News Coverage Approachesmentioning

confidence: 99%

What’s with the water: The nature of reporting on the problem of nitrates in Nebraska

Walsh

Perreault

2023

Newspaper Research Journal

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This article examines how 22 Nebraska newspapers and a wire service covered nitrate contamination in Nebraska’s groundwater over nearly 4 years. We found coverage lacked depth and examined a few solutions although 88% of Nebraskans get drinking water from the ground. Reliance on fertilizer and irrigation for crop production leads to groundwater contamination, making this a concerning coverage gap as climate change impacts promise to make farming more challenging and increase environmental risks.

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Section: Local News Coverage Approachesmentioning

confidence: 99%

What’s with the water: The nature of reporting on the problem of nitrates in Nebraska

Walsh

Perreault

2023

Newspaper Research Journal

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“…The literature also shows that the closure of a local newspaper from a community can lead, for example, to less civic engagement (Shaker 2014) or lower voter turnout (Schulhofer-Wohl and Garrido 2009), while the offering of politically relevant information by local media increases voting turnout (Baekgaard et al 2014). However, in a changing news landscape, more recent studies show that turnout rates in major party elections do not significantly covary with an absence of local papers; that is, local news circulation is unrelated to higher turnout (Chapp and Aehl 2021).…”

Section: News Deserts Disinformation and Democracymentioning

confidence: 99%

No Media, No Voters? The Relationship between News Deserts and Voting Abstention

Ramos,

Torre,

Jerónimo

2023

Social Sciences

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Local journalism has suffered major transformations as traditional business models collapse and habits of news consumption change. A lack of funding and successive economic crises have brought about, on a global scale, the shutdown of many news outlets in smaller territories. These areas are becoming “news deserts”, a phenomenon that has been mapped in Brazil and Portugal. Territories without news could see an uptick in social problems such as disinformation, populism, and democratic crises, especially because of voting abstention. Background: This paper aims to analyze the relationship between news deserts and democracy, focusing on how news deserts correlate with voting abstention rates in Brazil and Portugal. Methods: A literature review was carried out including data from news deserts in both countries. The abstention rates in this analysis concern national elections held in 2022. A correlation analysis using binary logistic regression was deployed comparing municipalities with the highest and the lowest abstention rates. Results: In both countries, it was not possible to assess whether there was a correlation between abstention rates and the existence of news deserts. Conclusions: While the absence of media outlets is not correlated with the mobilization of citizens to vote, other variables may be affecting voters’ abstention behaviors.

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An evaluation of online information acquisition in US news deserts

Greene,

Pisharody,

Guevara

et al. 2024

Sci Rep

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A growing concern is that as local newspapers disappear, communities lose trusted gatekeepers and develop information voids, creating openings for misinformation to thrive. Previous work has not evaluated whether residents of news deserts have developed different information acquisition habits. We fill this gap by directly comparing information consumption and referral patterns inside and outside of news deserts in a novel dataset of engagement with online media by millions of users on the Edge browser. We find little evidence that those in news deserts consume more low-quality sites or are more likely to be referred to low-quality sites from search engines or social media. We find some evidence that those in news deserts do consume more national news than locations with local media outlets. These results contribute to our understanding of how the loss of local newspapers has impacted online information acquisition.

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Newspapers and political participation: The relationship between ballot rolloff and local newspaper circulation

Cited by 4 publications

References 48 publications

What’s with the water: The nature of reporting on the problem of nitrates in Nebraska

What’s with the water: The nature of reporting on the problem of nitrates in Nebraska

No Media, No Voters? The Relationship between News Deserts and Voting Abstention

An evaluation of online information acquisition in US news deserts

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