Media Plurality Online: Attention to News on Social Media

Media plurality is the cornerstone of a well-functioning democratic society in which citizens are exposed to a wide range of viewpoints from a variety of different sources, and where any one media owner, or voice, does not have too much influence over public opinion and the political agenda.

Ofcom's current statutory duties in this area include securing and maintaining a sufficient plurality of providers of different TV and radio services. Ofcom also has a duty to periodically review the operation of the media ownership rules listed under section 391 of the Communications Act 2003.

Since these duties were introduced in 2003, the way that people access news and information has changed significantly. The importance of online news sources has grown dramatically, driving changes in our consumption habits - particularly among younger people - while social media, search engines and news aggregators are increasingly acting as intermediaries between news content and consumers. Our research to date found that a large percentage of people now get their news from social media.

We want to understand what influence social media have over the news diets of their users. In this study, we are interested in finding out how much they can influence the attention users pay to news content. To do this we wish to commission a research partner to undertake an online experiment and provide a report to Ofcom which shows the impact that the placement and prominence of news content has on the amount of attention received from users.