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Data journalism in the UK: A preliminary analysis of form and content
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More than two years ago Sir Tim Berners-Lee made the pronouncement that ‘Journalists need to be data-savvy … but now it's also going to be about poring over data and equipping yourself with the tools to analyse it and picking out what's interesting’. 5This new form of data-driven journalism appears to have been enthusiastically adopted - at least in the rhetoric of news discourse, according to which it is ‘rapidly becoming part of the establishment’. This analysis is a preliminary survey of data-based stories being presented in the national news in the UK, and lays the groundwork for an analysis and typology of the forms and formats of data journalism as a media practice. The analysis shows that while superficial data journalism is being practiced, it is limited in scope and format. No evidence was found of a commitment to data projects among the news outlets examined, and only one instance of recourse to the Freedom of Information Act was seen. Most data presented were superficial, and sourced from traditional outlets. Data journalism is practiced as much for its visual appeal as for its investigative qualities, and the overall impact, especially in the tabloid format is as much decorative as informative.
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... The second phase of studies on data journalism is in the form of case studies examining its status in the global north and global south. Although there have been studies examining the practices and status of data journalism in different developed countries, studies conducted in the UK have carved out a significant place in the literature (Knight 2015;Hannaford 2015;Borges-Rey 2016, 2020Arias-Robles and López 2021;and Tong 2022). The aforementioned studies have undertaken an analysis of data journalism practices in the United Kingdom by gathering data directly from the field. ...
... In this way, some professionals who were outside the field of journalism became acquainted with data journalism and started to turn towards this field (Appelgren and Lindén 2020). The main reference to the origin of this concept is seen as computer-assisted reporting (CAR) (Howard 2014;Knight 2015;and Anderson 2018). Scholars in this field have commonly characterised CAR as a form of journalistic inquiry employed in extensive news endeavours, employing many statistical methodologies in its production (Gynnild 2014). ...
... One of the initial great expectations for data journalism was that it would be recognised as the journalism of the future (Knight 2015). But it has since been argued that this anticipation was not entirely fulfilled within a certain timeframe, and that instances of data journalism were rarely observed in establishments beyond prominent news organisations (Stalph and Borges-Rey 2018). ...
This study investigates the function of data journalism in a UK newsroom using Bourdieu's field theory. The collection of study data was conducted through in-depth interviews, utilising a qualitative research methodology. The data obtained revealed that data journalism, a sub-field of journalism, continues to develop in an interdisciplinary structure and creates a new type of habitus (data habitus) within the field of journalism. This study also shows that the data journalism team in the newspaper has moved from being niche to being established as one of the most active and effective main sections of the newsroom, and that data-driven journalism has the potential to influence other teams. Lastly, this study suggested that the newsroom is undergoing a process of datafication by indicating the newspaper's intention to develop data skills beyond the data journalism team.
... In 2015, Knight (2015) analysed a sample of data-based stories presented in the UK national news media. His findings revealed that data journalism had been superficially practised and was limited in scope and format, so the overall impact was as much decorative as informative. ...
This chapter reviews recent literature to provide an overview of the current state of the field in technological innovation in journalism generally and science and health journalism specifically. This chapter begins by asking, “How can technology improve science and health journalism?” To answer this question, we will first discuss the challenges that science and health journalism face, as well as how technology can help overcome those challenges. The chapter’s second question is, “How can we use technology to connect the public with science and health?” We investigate how technology can improve science journalism in terms of simplicity, context, and interactive storytelling, thereby increasing community engagement with science and health. Finally this chapter identifies gaps in the existing research, and provides directions and questions for future research.
... Online. Such studies focus on characterizing the number, complexity, and types of visualizations within pieces of data journalism (Knight, 2015;Stalph, 2018;Stalph & Heravi, 2021;Tandoc & Oh, 2017). Data visualizations are also a key element in popular science magazines, although scholarship in this area has typically focused on other visual forms, specifically photography (Born, 2020;Remillard, 2011). ...
... El aumento de la cultura de la transparencia, el activismo en torno a los datos abiertos que ha crecido en los últimos años, y las prácticas relacionadas con la era del Big Data han influido en la forma de entender el Periodismo de Investigación, que ha evolucionado hacia el Periodismo de Datos, según apuntan La Rosa y Sandoval-Martín (2016). Asimismo, se considera que el Periodismo de Datos es una especialización profesional heredera del Periodismo de Precisión (Meyer, 1991) y del Periodismo Asistido por ordenador (Knight, 2015). El Periodismo de Datos se presenta, por tanto, como un área de especialización que, además de aportar información de calidad de forma novedosa, se manifiesta como un instrumento interesante para combatir el ecosistema actual de noticias falsas, según Saavedra et al (2020). ...
Desde que se aprobó en España la Ley 19/2013 de transparencia, acceso a la información pública y buen gobierno, el periodismo ha aprovechado las herramientas que esta norma ofrece de diversas maneras. Sin embargo, existen escasos estudios que aborden la relación entre la transparencia y el periodismo. Esta investigación aspira a conocer si el estado actual de la transparencia en España es adecuado para el ejercicio del periodismo, así como a descubrir la utilidad de estas herramientas en el ejercicio del Periodismo de Datos y en la lucha contra la desinformación. Asimismo, busca conocer las principales necesidades de los periodistas en una posible reforma de la normativa. Para ello, se ha elaborado una metodología Delphi, que ha contado con las valoraciones de diez especialistas en la materia, tanto desde el punto de vista académico, como del profesional, es decir, periodistas especializados. Se han llevado a cabo dos rondas de cuestionarios, la primera, para conseguir información relevante sobre esta temática, y la segunda, para lograr un consenso entre las personas especialistas. Los resultados evidencian la necesidad de reformar la normativa y la utilidad de la transparencia para verificar y contrastar bulos. Asimismo, resulta necesario formar a los periodistas en transparencia.
... Over the past forty years, the reader-writer relationship has undergone significant modifications because of the development of audience theory. Ideas on "audience" and the reader-writer relationship have evolved, from cognitive theories to social constructionists who focus mostly on digital media [29]. ...
The aim of this study is to investigate the audience reception of acculturation in parenting style on the Indonesian-Korean YouTube channel "Kimbab Family". Parenting is an activity aimed at helping children to meet challenges from the environment as well as developing. This study focuses on the interpretations of young adult audiences on the YouTube channel. Thirty-six informants were selected as primary data using FGD techniques. From the results obtained by the researchers through FGDs with the informants, it was shown that the audiences reception on the YouTube channel is diverse and influential. By combining Indonesian and Korean parenting styles, the Kimbab Family has become a source of inspiration and a role model for effective parenting. This research highlights the need for further exploration of the role of media platforms in shaping audience perceptions and expectations, as well as the potential benefits and challenges of incorporating diverse cultural influences in parenting practices.
This paper draws on diverse psychological, behavioural and numerical literature to understand some of the challenges we all face in making sense of large-scale phenomena and use this to create a road map for HCI responses. This body of knowledge offers tools and principles that can help HCI researchers deliver value now, but also highlights challenges for future HCI research. The paper is framed by looking at patterns and information that highlight some of the common misunderstandings that arise—not just for politicians and the general public but also for many in the academic community. This paper does not have all the answers to this, but we hope it provides some and, perhaps more importantly, raises questions that we need to address as scientific and technical communities.
The rise of Twitter as a news platform has radically changed the way we
access, consume, and share news. Twitter becomes an important hub to
quickly and easily access accurate information in times of crisis such as
COVID-19 and is frequently used in journalism practices. This study examines
how the COVID-19 pandemic is covered by news agencies in the Twitter
ecosystem, the weight of the news about the pandemic in tweets and the
sentiment analysis of the news. Within the scope of the study, the tweets
related to COVID-19 shared between 2020 and 2021 by eight news agencies
(BBC World, Reuters, CNN, Associated Press, TRT World, AL Jazeera English,
DW English, Euronews) that broadcast on a global scale and have a high
number of followers on Twitter are analyzed by using text mining methods.
Firstly, the frequently used words in tweets were obtained by using the text
analysis technique n-gram. Secondly, the sentiment values of all the tweets
and the words are computed and later classified into certain categories.
Lexicon based sentiment dictionaries such as VADER and NRC utilized in
the sentiment analysis process. Findings reveal that messages containing
fear, anxiety, sadness, and negative polarity are prevalent in the news during
the pandemic.
This study finds stories using computer-assisted reporting are as credible as stories based on anecdotal evidence or authoritative sources.
A content analysis of 3,900 news stories examined how online news differs in coverage from newspapers, network television, cable television, and radio, finding that 60% of the top stories on news Web sites covered the same topics as covered by legacy media. But fewer than a third of news stories hyperlinked by blogs and social media corresponded with mainstream media top stories. The results indicate that journalism's agenda-setting role, though dissipating, remains viable in the fragmenting media universe. Audiences turning to news Web sites will find the dominant stories of the day plus fresh perspectives on national and world events.
This paper reviews diffusion of on-line research at daily newspapers in the USA during a five-year period from 1994 to 1998. Diffusion literature indicates new technical innovations require certain social and economic conditions and other factors before adoption begins. Once the adoption process begins, it takes place in stages before reaching critical mass. Data collected in this study confirms Everett M. Rogers' process model. The World Wide Web has become the dominant on-line research tool for journalists. Commercial services that provide access to government databases and archival databases, such as those containing newspapers and magazines, are also in wide use. While general computer use in newsrooms has increased, so has the frequency of use of on-line services. Primary resources used to search the web are AltaVista and Yahoo! and journalists most often used government sites. Internet technologies were not widely used during the five years studied. Adoption of computers and the internet- web appear complete, but the adoption process in some advanced-use categories remains in process.
This paper reports findings of a longitudinal study of the leading problems identified by journalists using the World Wide Web for newsgathering. Respondents to 1997 and 1998 national surveys listed their perceptions of flaws in the Web as a newsgathering source. Data from additional national surveys conducted in 1994, 1995, and 1996 are also reported. The analysis found growing use of the Web and commercial online services for newsgathering during each of the five years, but use increased the most in 1996 and 1997. Among the leading problems journalists identified in using online sources were verification of facts, sites containing unreliable information, badly sourced information, and lack of source credibility. Web-related problems, based on the technology itself, were not perceived to be as severe. The study found a growing need for ongoing newsroom training and development of online research skills among reporters and their editors.
The graphic portrayal of quantitative information has deep roots. These roots reach into histories of thematic cartography, statistical graphics, and data visualization, which are intertwined with each other. They also connect with the rise of statistical thinking up through the 19th century, and developments in technology into the 20th century. From above ground, we can see the current fruit; we must look below to see its pedigree and germination. There certainly have been many new things in the world of visualization; but unless you know its history, everything might seem novel.
A state-wide survey of daily newspapers finds 80 percent are using electronic information sources, with all using electronic morgues and most using two or more electronic sources. © 1996, © 1996 Newspaper and Online News Division of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication.
This article reports how journalists integrate online research procedures into the overall research process, how they assess the Internet and search engines, and how highly developed their competences are in using search engines. Observation of 235 journalists from newspaper, radio, television and online media platforms provide the data base. To this is added a written survey of 601 journalists and the participation of 48 journalists in an experiment. The observation phase revealed that journalists employ computer-aided research tools more frequently but for shorter periods than classical, non-computer-aided research tools. The telephone remains the most important research tool. Search engines, in particular Google, dominate the source-determination process and thereby have a decisive influence on the entire course of journalists' research. The survey showed that a high level of journalistic attention focused on only a few Internet offerings. The surveyed journalists exhibit a pragmatic attitude towards the Internet and search engines as a research tool, even though they are aware of possible problems. The search-engine experiment revealed that journalists only achieved moderate success in their research. The greatest search success was achieved by journalists who entered the search terms in a thought-out manner and combined them logically. Overall, the study shows that computer-aided research supplements but does not displace classical research. Instead, the Internet gains in significance in those tasks which it helps to fulfil more efficiently. However, the increased self-referentiality in journalism and the “Google-ization” of research represent a cause for concern.