Hispanics, African Americans Dissatisfied With News Coverage of Minority Communities, Study Finds
A new study has found that although Hispanics and African Americans are keeping up with the digital age, they are not satisfied with the news content delivered through modern outlets.
On Wednesday, Media Insight Project, a collaboration by the American Press Institute and The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, released their report, titled "The Personal News Cycle: A focus on African American and Hispanic news consumers."
According to the report, Hispanics and African Americans are the United States' two biggest minority groups. Both groups were expected to fall behind technologically in a "digital divide" but have instead been using digital technology for news consumption in similar rates to the general U.S. population. In fact, the two groups are "adapting to mobile technology at even higher rates than non-Hispanic whites."
Many Hispanics and African Americans are not satisfied with how accurately the media covers their respective neighborhoods, however.
"Only a third of Hispanics and a quarter of African Americans believe their communities are accurately portrayed in the media, and a major reason for this may be that they feel their communities are not paid much attention in the news," the report explains. "Only half of adults in either group believe their communities are covered regularly in the media today."
Fifty-seven percent of Hispanics and 58 percent of African Americans think that digital technology has made it more easy to stay informed than it was five years ago (compared to 6 in 10 Americans overall). When it comes to the minorities groups' respective ethnic communities, on the other hand, both were found to be "just as likely to say nothing has changed" in the past five years.
"... 71 percent of African Americans and 74 percent of Hispanics -- falls in the middle and says their communities are covered just 'somewhat regularly' or 'only occasionally.'" the report explains. "Most of that group, about 4 in 10 overall, say their communities are covered only occasionally. And 3 percent of African Americans and Hispanics say they feel their groups are basically never covered."
The top newsgathering devices for Hispanics were found to be the TV at 60 percent, followed by the Internet at 19 percent. African Americans also favored the TV at 39 percent; 25 percent reported using the Internet.
Hispanics were more likely to get news from Hispanic "focused news organizations" (48 percent), while African Americans relied most on local TV news stations (23 percent).
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Follow Scharon Harding on Twitter: @ScharHar.
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