Are Indian readers more tolerant of political bias in news reporting? Yes they are, shows Pew Survey!

Pic by Priscilla-du-Preez

But readers globally would prefer more local stories to global and political news in their newspapers 

Highly polarised and political as it is this should perhaps come as music to some sections of the Indian media.

It appears a significant number of Indian readers are more tolerant of political bias in news reporting when compared to readers in the rest of the world, as per the findings of the latest Global Attitudes Survey by the Pew Research Center of media consumption habits and opinions of readers in 38 countries.

Compared to the median of three-quarters (75%) respondents globally who said media bias is never permissible, compared with 20% who say it is sometimes acceptable, Indian readers were the exception where 41% of them said it was acceptable for news organizations to, at times favour one political party, as against only 25% who said it is never acceptable. Interestingly, a third of Indians expressed no opinion on the matter, the study points out. 

Israel and the Philippines also stand as relative exceptions to the strong global consensus in this respect with four-in-ten respondents in both the countries, saying it is acceptable for news organizations to sometimes favour one political party over others.

Surveying adult population of 18 years plus in the Delhi and 16 of the 18 most populous states, in Indian excluding Kerala and Assam, the study had one of the largest samples from India at 2464 readers.

Exceptional as this finding might appear, the report also points out an individual’s political orientation tends to be one of the strongest factors underlying attitudes about the news media, mor than age, education or gender. In 21 countries, how people felt about the media was linked to support for the governing party. In most cases, those who identify with the party in charge tend to be more sanguine about the news media, it adds. Perhaps a case of confirmation bias?

The respondents were asked four different sets of questions on coverage of important issues, accuracy of coverage, fairness of political coverage and coverage of government leaders and issues. 

Some of the findings of the study are however not so surprising.  As we have known and taught in journalism school, news is where home is. Local and national news trumps global and sometimes even political news where readership is concerned which is a clear indication for news editors to reduce political and global news on their front pages and in the news-pages in general.

While an overwhelming 86% of the respondents said they followed national news closely, including an average of 44% who say they follow it very closely, 78% of them say they follow local news stories closely of whom a significant 36% indicated it is their staple diet.

More importantly, a majority (73%) of the readers in these 38 countries felt the media in general was doing very well where reporting important issues was concerned while 62% also felt they are doing so accurately particularly where reporting on government leaders and officials was concerned.