The Consequences of He Said, She Said Journalism

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For a long time, those closely watching the climate debate unfold have denounced โ€œhe said, she said, weโ€™re cluelessโ€ journalism, in which reporters present a โ€œdebateโ€ between those who accept the science and those who do not, and leave it at that. Let the reader figure out whoโ€™s right, the philosophy seems to be. Itโ€™s journalistic โ€œobjectivityโ€ not to โ€œtakeย sidesโ€โ€”right?

Those criticizing this approachโ€”myself emphatically includedโ€”are working under a key assumption: If journalists would take a stand on matters of fact (such as whether global warming is caused by humans), rather than treating them as un-resolvable, the broader political discourse would also shift onto a firmer footing. Thatโ€™s because we would move towards having a shared factual basis for making policy decisions, rather than fighting over the very reality upon which policy ought to beย based.

Itโ€™s in this context that a new studyย (PDF)ย published in the Journal of Communication, would appear to break new groundโ€“by actually examining the psychological effect that โ€œhe said, she saidโ€ or โ€œpassiveโ€ journalism has on readers, and in particular, on their views of whether itโ€™s possible to discern the truth.

The study, conducted by The Ohio State University communications professor Raymond Pingree, did not focus on climate change but rather the U.S. healthcare debateโ€”but the same lesson would seem to apply. Study subjects were asked to read fake news stories in which two disputes about the contents of a healthcare bill were either left unresolved, or factually adjudicated. In other words, sometimes the subjects were exposed to โ€œhe said, she saidโ€ coverage, and sometimes they were exposed to a breed of journalism that unflinchingly examines where the truthย lies.

Then the study subjects answered survey questions about their confidence in whether it was possible to discern the truth in politics. For instance, they were asked how much they agreed that โ€œIf I wanted to, I could figure out the facts behind most political disputes.โ€ What kind of article theyโ€™d read had a significant effect: Those whoโ€™d read the โ€œpassiveโ€ story were more, er, postmodern in outlook. They were less sure they could discern the truth (if itย existed).

Pingree, the study author, does not seem shy in discussing the implications of these results. โ€œChoosing among government policies is simply not like choosing among flavors of ice cream,โ€ he has stated. โ€œPolicy questions quite frequently center on facts, and political disputes can and often do hinge on these facts, not only on subjectiveย matters.โ€

The context for discussing Pingreeโ€™s study is critical: The news business has changed vastly, and Pingree asserts that journalists are far less likely to plainly state where the facts lie than they were in daysย past.

This may be partly an economic issue: Journalists are stretched thinner and thinner and may not have time to adequately research their stories. Thereโ€™s no doubt that โ€œhe said, she saidโ€ is the easier approach to take in a time of declining newsroom staff and increasing journalist multitaskingโ€”not just reporting, but also constantly blogging, making online videos about their reports, and muchย more.

If you combine together Pingreeโ€™s analysis of mainstream journalism with an analysis of the rest of the political opinion environmentโ€”where everyone is shouting their own facts all the time, and diametrically opposed blogs service irreconcilably different worldviewsโ€”then no wonder some citizens are pretty down onย โ€œtruth.โ€

Pingree thinks our politics suffer as a result. โ€œThat may make it easier for people to just quit following politics at all, or to accept dishonesty in politicians,โ€ he states. I would tend to agree.

Hereโ€™s the study reference and PDFย link:ย 

Pingree, R. J. 2011. Effects of Unresolved Factual Disputes in the News on Epistemic Political Efficacy.ย ย Journal of Communication.

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