One survey group, Pew Research, has made public the data from a recent survey which states that over 50% of Americans currently get the majority of their news via social media — but the overall number that frequently take to social media as a main source of news has been rapidly dwindling.
The survey, which was carried out between July 18th through the 21st of August and sported well over 12,000 respondents, put forth a variety of questions concerning the respondent’s news consumption habits. One the survey was able to narrow down the p[eople who at least “rarely” acquire their news via “digital devices,” the survey then asked: “Now thinking about the news you get on a smartphone, computer, or tablet, how often do you get news from … social media such as Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram?”
Roughly seventeen percent of those who responded seemed to indicate that they “often” get all of their news via social media, while roughly 33% stated that they “sometimes” do. Over twenty percent issued a response that they “rarely” take to social media to get their news, while about 295 stated that they never do.
The percentage of people who “often” head to social media to get their news is down for the second year straight. In 2020, the level was at 23%, and back in 2021, it was sitting at 19%. These percentages for the “sometimes” category went up from 30% to 33%, while the now combined “never” and “rarely” saw a jump of two points from 47% to 49%.
As stated in the survey, the most utilized social media site for news was YouTube, with over 82% of the survey respondents indicating that they make use of the site. Facebook took the number 2 slot with 70%, while Instagram took a far distant third place with 47%.
This particular survey takes place as quite a few social media companies have put in place far more restrictive policies concerning political news.
Back in August, TikTok chose to update its guidelines regarding politics in advance of the 2022 midterm election..
“TikTok isn’t a go-to hub for breaking news, and we don’t accept paid political ads, but we are committed to combatting the spread of misinformation on the platform, including through supporting our community with education and authoritative information on important public topics like elections,” states the election integrity policy.
Both Facebook and Twitter also put in place new and updated guidelines.
As part of a blog post from August, Meta, the parent company for Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram stated that their overall “approach” to the upcoming midterms “exceeds the measures we implemented during the last midterm election in 2018.” The updates include new security procedures in order to deal with alleged domestic and foreign interference and influence, transparency regarding political ads, and more.