Understanding news consumption by young people in Malta on social media platforms

Abstract

This study examines the dynamics of news consumption on social media through online self-administered surveys targeted at young people aged 18 to 29 years, and one-on-one semi-structured interviews with 14 young social media users also aged between 18 and 29 years. The surveys reveal that the mobile phone is the most used device by respondents, that Facebook is the social media platform they access most, and that they are very interested in news about Malta. Respondents said that they encounter news by regularly accessing social media sites even if they were not looking for it. The semi-structured interviews reveal that young people consume news incidentally, but there may be a substantial part of the population that consumes news on social media in both incidental and intentional ways. Interviews also revealed that most young social media users perceive certain individuals in their social media feeds as opinion leaders and that they trust them and think very highly of them. This study also explores how journalists use social media and how access to new sources of information has impacted the newsgathering process and how information is disseminated. News consumption as described by respondents also raises major editorial implications for news media outlets with regards to their use of social media platforms to reach audiences and how they source and share stories. A diagram of an emerging media ecosystem illustrates where online communities discuss and add to the stories created by media outlets.