Lower levels of news use are generally understood to be associated with less political engagement among citizens. But while some people simply have a low preference for news, others avoid the news intentionally. So far little is known about the relationship between active news avoidance and civic engagement in society, a void this study has set out to fill. Based on a four-wave general population panel survey in the Netherlands, conducted between April and July 2020 (N = 1,084) during a crisis situation, this research-in-brief investigates the development of news avoidance and pro-social civic engagement over time. Results suggest that higher news topic avoidance results in higher levels of civic engagement. The study discusses different explanations for why less news can mean more engagement.
This study investigates the degree of news avoidance during the first months of the Covid-19 pandemic in the Netherlands. Based on two panel surveys conducted in the period April–June 2020, this study shows that the increased presence of this behavior, can be explained by negative emotions and feelings the news causes by citizens. Moreover, news avoidance indeed has a positive effect on perceived well-being. These findings point to an acting balance for individual news consumers. In a pandemic such as Covid-19 news consumers need to be informed, but avoiding news is sometimes necessary to stay mentally healthy.
MULTIFILE
The number of people that intentionally avoid the news is growing. This could have several personal and societal implications. Previous research exposed various motives to avoid news, which lead to different manifestations of news avoidance, and consequently different implications. However, so far less is known about the differences in news avoidance types. In this study, we aim to explore different profiles of news avoiders beyond demographics, based on their motives to avoid news, values in life and personality traits. We analyze how this relates to background characteristics, the degree of news avoidance (occasional, regular, consistent), and news consumption. We rely on a survey conducted in The Netherlands (N = 2798) in March 2022. We conducted a Latent Profile Analysis and found seven news avoiders’ profiles: (1) interested occasional avoider; (2) emotive occasional avoider; (3) critical occasional avoider; (4) status-driven occasional avoider; (5) skeptical frequent avoider; (6) news outsider; and (7) convinced frequent avoider. This provides a nuanced picture of news avoidance.
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