In addition to their well-publicized financial woes, newspapers have a credibility problem, as Americans’ confidence in them continues to decline.
A Gallup poll of 1,529 adults
conducted June 1-4 found that the proportion of respondents expressing “a great deal” of confidence in newspapers slipped from 25% in 2012 to 23% this year; in 2011 28% of Americans
expressed a great deal of confidence in newspapers.
Although there have been temporary oscillations, the general long-term direction of the trend is clearly down, as the number of
Americans expressing a great deal of confidence in newspapers previously declined from 51% in 1979 to 37% in 2000 and just over 30% in 2006.
Conservatives were least likely to trust
newspapers, with just 15% saying they have a great deal of confidence in them, compared to 25% of moderates and 31% of liberals. The proportion of conservatives expressing confidence is down from 21%
last year, while the proportion of moderates is down from 28% in 2011, and the proportion of liberals is down from a recent peak of 39% in 2009.
College graduates were also less
likely to trust newspapers (16%) than people with post-graduate education (25%). Younger people were more likely to trust newspapers, with 30% of people ages 18-29 expressing a great deal of
confidence, compared to 22% of people ages 30-49 and 17% of people ages 50 to 64.
On the positive side, newspapers did manage to beat big business (22%), organized labor (20%), health
care organizations 19%), and Congress (10%) in the Gallup poll for 2013. TV news was tied with newspapers at 23%, up from 21% last year -- but just half the 46% confidence rating it received in 1993
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