State of the News Media 2015

Call it a mobile majority. At the start of 2015, 39 of the top 50 digital news websites have more traffic to their sites and associated applications coming from mobile devices than from desktop computers, according to Pew Research Center’s analysis of comScore data.

At the same time, though, desktop visitors to these sites tend to spend more time per visit than do mobile visitors. For half of these top 50 news sites – which include legacy print, cable, network, international and public broadcasting outlets as well as digital-only entities – visitors from desktops stay longer than those coming through mobile. The reverse is true for only 10 of the sites, while for 15 sites the time spent is roughly equal.

In tandem with the growth of mobile has been the further rise of the social Web, where the flow of information embodies a whole new dynamic....

The State of the News Media 2015 is the twelfth edition of an annual report by the Pew Research Center’s Journalism Project examining the landscape of American journalism. This year’s study includes 13 data-filled fact sheets, each of which provides the latest audience, economic, news investment and ownership trends for key sectors of news media, from cable TV to African-American media to news magazines. This study also includes a searchable Media & News Indicators database.

Big Drop in Share of Americans Calling Themselves Christian

The Christian share of adults in the United States has declined sharply since 2007, affecting nearly all major Christian traditions and denominations, and crossing age, race and region, according to an extensive survey by the Pew Research Center.

Seventy-one percent of American adults were Christian in 2014, the lowest estimate from any sizable survey to date, and a decline of 5 million adults and 8 percentage points since a similar Pew survey in 2007.

The Christian share of the population has been declining for decades, but the pace rivals or even exceeds that of the country’s most significant demographic trends, like the growing Hispanic population. It is not confined to the coasts, the cities, the young or the other liberal and more secular groups where one might expect it, either.

More from the New York Times.

There are now approximately 56 million religiously unaffiliated adults living in America, according to the study, which is a follow-up to a similar study conducted in 2007. The "nones," as they are known, are more numerous than either Catholics or mainline Protestants, and second only to evangelical Protestants.

Millennials have played a significant role in the extraordinary growth of unaffiliated Americans, a phenomena called “generational replacement.”

But it's not only the millennial generation driving this shift in the religious landscape. Older Americans are also exiting from organized religion. Nearly 25 percent of Generation Xers identified as unaffiliated in 2014, a four-point increase from 2007.

More from the Huffington Post.

A Deep Dive Into Party Affiliation

Democrats hold advantages in party identification among blacks, Asians, Hispanics, well-educated adults and Millennials. Republicans have leads among whites – particularly white men, those with less education and evangelical Protestants – as well as members of the Silent Generation...

The share of independents in the public, which long ago surpassed the percentages of either Democrats or Republicans, continues to increase. Based on 2014 data, 39% identify as independents, 32% as Democrats and 23% as Republicans. This is the highest percentage of independents in more than 75 years of public opinion polling. (For a timeline of party affiliation among the public since 1939, see this interactive feature.)

When the partisan leanings of independents are taken into account, 48% either identify as Democrats or lean Democratic; 39% identify as Republicans or lean Republican. The gap in leaned party affiliation has held fairly steady since 2009, when Democrats held a 13-point advantage (50% to 37%).

More from Pew Reearch.

Technology's Impact on Workers

The internet and cell phones have infiltrated every cranny of American workplaces, and digital technology has transformed vast numbers of American jobs. Work done in the most sophisticated scientific enterprises, entirely new technology businesses, the extensive array of knowledge and media endeavors, the places where crops are grown, the factory floor, and even mom-and-pop stores has been reshaped by new pathways to information and new avenues of selling goods and services. For most office workers now, life on the job means life online.

Pew Research surveyed online a representative sample of adult internet users and asked those who have jobs a series of questions about the role of digital technology in their work lives. This is not a sample representative of all workers. It covers online adults who also have full- or part-time jobs in any capacity....

Email and the internet are deemed the most important communications and information tools among online workers.

The high value of email comes despite the challenges of the past generation, including threats like spam and phishing and competitors like social media and texting. Surprisingly, landline phones outrank cell phones for these internet-using workers. Social media is very low in importance....

While commentators worry that digital tools can be a distraction in the workplace, many online workers say that is not the case when it comes to their productivity.

The GOP’s Millennial problem runs deep

From the Pew Research Center:

The Republican Party’s struggles in appealing to young people have been well documented. And even those Millennials who do identify as Republicans or lean toward the GOP are decidedly less conservative than older Republicans.

Overall, Millennials (currently ages 18-33) are the most liberal age group. In our report on Political Polarization in the American Public, we used a scale based on 10 political values questions about the role of government, the environment, homosexuality and other issues to measure ideological consistency. This survey of more than 10,000 Americans finds that, on this scale, Millennials are considerably more liberal than other generations: About four-in-ten Millennials are mostly (28%) or consistently (13%) liberal in their views, compared with 15% who are mostly (12%) or consistently (3%) conservative (44% are ideologically mixed). Older generations are progressively more conservative.

How Increasing Ideological Uniformity and Partisan Antipathy Affect Politics, Compromise and Everyday Life

Republicans and Democrats are more divided along ideological lines – and partisan antipathy is deeper and more extensive – than at any point in the last two decades. These trends manifest themselves in myriad ways, both in politics and in everyday life. And a new survey of 10,000 adults nationwide finds that these divisions are greatest among those who are the most engaged and active in the political process.

The overall share of Americans who express consistently conservative or consistently liberal opinions has doubled over the past two decades from 10% to 21%. And ideological thinking is now much more closely aligned with partisanship than in the past. As a result, ideological overlap between the two parties has diminished: Today, 92% of Republicans are to the right of the median Democrat, and 94% of Democrats are to the left of the median Republican.

Today 92% of Republicans are to the right of the median Democrat, and 94% of Democrats are to the left of the median Republican
Partisan animosity has increased substantially over the same period. In each party, the share with a highly negative view of the opposing party has more than doubled since 1994. Most of these intense partisans believe the opposing party’s policies “are so misguided that they threaten the nation’s well-being.”

More from Pew Research.

Ideology Influences Community Preference

From Demo Memo:

Would you prefer to live in a community where 1) Houses are larger and farther apart but schools, stores and restaurants are miles away? or 2) Houses are smaller and closer to each other, but schools, stores and restaurants are within walking distance?

That question is posed by Pew Research Center in its 2014 Political Polarization in the American Public survey. The results of the survey show not only growing political polarization between liberals and conservatives over the years, but also that liberals and conservatives are divided by the type of community in which they would prefer to live.

Overall, the public is about evenly split in its community preference, with 49 percent preferring a larger house farther away from amenities and 48 percent preferring a smaller house in a walkable community. By political ideology, the split is anything but even, however...

Census struggles to reach an accurate number on gay marriages

From Pew Research:

Same-sex marriage is now legal in Washington, D.C., and 17 states... Now the federal government’s task is to produce an accurate count of same-sex married couples.

Acknowledging a “very serious problem” of flawed same-sex marriage data, the U.S. Census Bureau is testing new marriage and relationship questions on its surveys in hopes of producing more accurate numbers in the next few years. According to a presentation earlier this month, the bureau found problems with the data “much worse” than the agency expected.

There is intense interest in the numbers and characteristics of same-sex married couples, as a growing number of states have legalized same-sex marriage and the federal government—reacting to a Supreme Court ruling last year—has expanded the rights of those couples. The numbers are important to know as a measure of how society is changing, to gauge the well-being of same-sex married-couple families and to help government agencies assess the need for various types of programs. For example, marital status can affect eligibility for some programs such as welfare and food stamps.

Global Views on Morality

The Pew Center’s 2013 Global Attitudes survey asked 40,117 respondents in 40 countries what they thought about eight topics often discussed as moral issues: extramarital affairs, gambling, homosexuality, abortion, premarital sex, alcohol consumption, divorce, and the use of contraceptives. For each issue, respondents were asked whether this is morally acceptable, morally unacceptable, or not a moral issue. The chart below displays the median responses for each question across the 40 countries.

Millennials in Adulthood: Detached from Institutions, Networked with Friends

The Millennial generation is forging a distinctive path into adulthood. Now ranging in age from 18 to 331, they are relatively unattached to organized politics and religion, linked by social media, burdened by debt, distrustful of people, in no rush to marry— and optimistic about the future.

They are also America’s most racially diverse generation. In all of these dimensions, they are different from today’s older generations. And in many, they are also different from older adults back when they were the age Millennials are now.

Read more from the Pew Research Center.

A Portrait of Jewish Americans

From Pew Research:

American Jews overwhelmingly say they are proud to be Jewish and have a strong sense of belonging to the Jewish people, according to a major new survey by the Pew Research Center. But the survey also suggests that Jewish identity is changing in America, where one-in-five Jews (22%) now describe themselves as having no religion.

The percentage of U.S. adults who say they are Jewish when asked about their religion has declined by about half since the late 1950s and currently is a little less than 2%. Meanwhile, the number of Americans with direct Jewish ancestry or upbringing who consider themselves Jewish, yet describe themselves as atheist, agnostic or having no particular religion, appears to be rising and is now about 0.5% of the U.S. adult population.1

The changing nature of Jewish identity stands out sharply when the survey’s results are analyzed by generation.

Breadwinner Moms

A record 40% of all households with children under the age of 18 include mothers who are either the sole or primary source of income for the family, according to a new Pew Research Center analysis of data from the U.S. Census Bureau. The share was just 11% in 1960.

These “breadwinner moms” are made up of two very different groups: 5.1 million (37%) are married mothers who have a higher income than their husbands, and 8.6 million(63%) are single mothers.

The income gap between the two groups is quite large.

Read MORE.

Pew Research Center Releases 2013 State of News Media Report

From the Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism:


In 2012, a continued erosion of news reporting resources converged with growing opportunities for those in politics, government agencies, companies and others to take their messages directly to the public.

Signs of the shrinking reporting power are documented throughout this year’s report. Estimates for newspaper newsroom cutbacks in 2012 put the industry down 30% since its peak in 2000 and below 40,000 full-time professional employees for the first time since 1978. In local TV, our special content report reveals, sports, weather and traffic now account on average for 40% of the content produced on the newscasts studied while story lengths shrink. On CNN, the cable channel that has branded itself around deep reporting, produced story packages were cut nearly in half from 2007 to 2012. Across the three cable channels, coverage of live events during the day, which often require a crew and correspondent, fell 30% from 2007 to 2012 while interview segments, which tend to take fewer resources and can be scheduled in advance, were up 31%. Time magazine, the only major print news weekly left standing, cut roughly 5% of its staff in early 2013 as a part of broader company layoffs.

Pew Report on Global Social Networking

Social networking has spread around the world with remarkable speed. In countries such as Britain, the United States, Russia, the Czech Republic and Spain, about half of all adults now use Facebook and similar websites. These sites are also popular in many lower-income nations, where, once people have access to the internet, they tend to use it for social networking.

Meanwhile, cell phones have become nearly ubiquitous throughout much of the world, and people are using them in a variety of ways, including texting and taking pictures. Smart phones are also increasingly common – roughly half in Britain, the U.S., and Japan have one. Globally, most smart phone users say they visit social networking sites on their phone, while many get job, consumer, and political information.

More from Pew Research.
***
An element of our mission at the Library of Congress is to collect the story of America and to acquire collections that will have research value. So when the Library had the opportunity to acquire an archive from the popular social media service Twitter, we decided this was a collection that should be here.

In April 2010, the Library and Twitter signed an agreement providing the Library the public tweets from the company’s inception through the date of the agreement, an archive of tweets from 2006 through April 2010. Additionally, the Library and Twitter agreed that Twitter would provide all public tweets on an ongoing basis under the same terms.

The Library’s first objectives were to acquire and preserve the 2006-10 archive; to establish a secure, sustainable process for receiving and preserving a daily, ongoing stream of tweets through the present day; and to create a structure for organizing the entire archive by date.

More from the Library of Congress.

Restrictions on Religion Are Tightening

From the New York Times:

Government restrictions on religion around the world were highest in the Middle East and North Africa, particularly in the period before the Arab Spring uprisings, a new study has found, underscoring a factor that fueled hostilities in the region and led to the rise of political Islam after the revolts.

The study, by the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion and Public Life, said that in 2010 government restrictions on religion were “high or very high” in most of the Arab Spring countries, where suppression of Islamist movements contributed to the uprisings and spurred subsequent incursions of Islamists into political power.

Economic Mobility of the States

Economic Mobility of the States, released by Pew’s Economic Mobility Project, is the first time research has identified where in the country Americans are more likely to move up or down the earnings ladder. Eight states, primarily in the Mideast and New England regions, have higher upward and lower downward mobility than the nation as a whole, while states in the South have consistently lower upward and higher downward mobility. ... Economic Mobility of the States evaluates economic mobility in three ways, including absolute mobility – measuring residents’ average earnings growth over time – as well as upward and downward relative mobility – measuring people’s rank on the ladder relative to their peers.

The Latino Electorate in 2010

More than 6.6 million Latinos voted in last year's election—a record for a midterm—according to an analysis of new Census Bureau data by the Pew Hispanic Center, a project of the Pew Research Center. Latinos also were a larger share of the electorate in 2010 than in any previous midterm election, representing 6.9% of all voters, up from 5.8% in 2006...

However, even though more Latinos than ever are participating in the nation's elections, their representation among the electorate remains below their representation in the general population. In 2010, 16.3% of the nation's population was Latino, but only 10.1% of eligible voters and fewer than 7% of voters were Latino.

More HERE from the Pew Hispanic Center.

Other Sources of Census Data

From the Pew Research Center:

Many State Data Centers (here is a map with links to all of them) have repackaged census data for their localities in simple-to-use tables. In Alaska, the look-up includes Alaska native villages and tribal areas as well as cities, boroughs and other units of geography. California offers detailed data and some numbers from earlier years. Colorado offers rankings as well as data. Connecticut offers a color-coded map of population change and Indiana has population maps by school district and other geographies. Pennsylvania has detailed group quarters numbers for each of its counties.

Also take a look at the “Sites & Sources” section in the right-hand column. This very blog is linked! Way cool.

Pew Internet & American Life Project

As described by hillsearch.org

If you're interested in learning more about the impact of the internet on families, communities, work and home, check out the Pew Internet & American Life Project. The Project produces reports exploring these topics, including how they impact daily life, education, health care, and civic and political life.

The Pew Internet & American Life Project studies the social impact of the internet, focusing on topics such as health, teens, and broadband. Its three main topic areas are Activities & Pursuits, Demographics, and Technology & Media. The Project provides access to a number of data tools, including research reports and commentary, infographics, trend data, survey questions, and datasets. Data is based on phone surveys, online surveys, and qualitative research.

Recent reports include: The Internet as a Diversion, Teens and Mobile Phones Over the Past Five Years, Wireless Internet Use, Home Broadband Adoption, and The State of Music Online. To see these reports and many more, visit the Pew Internet & American Life Project.

The Future is Wireless

Pew Internet Report: Wireless Internet Use, July 22, 2009

56% Of All Americans Have Accessed The Internet By Wireless Means

Overview

An April 2009 survey conducted by the Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project asked respondents whether they had used a variety of devices - laptops, cell phones, game consoles, and more - to go online using a wireless network. Altogether, 56% of Americans said they have at some point used wireless means for online access.

* 39% of all Americans have used a laptop computer to go online wirelessly, making this the most prevalent means of wireless access.

* 32% of all Americans have gotten online with a mobile device - meaning they have used a cell phone or other handheld device to check email, access the internet for information, or send instant messages.

Together, laptop and mobile wireless access account for the vast majority of wireless access, as 51% of Americans have gotten online using either of these two methods. Some people (19% of Americans) opt for both means of wireless access - portable laptops on fast WiFi networks or handheld access on slower networks from cell carriers.

Use of the internet on mobile devices has grown sharply from the end of 2007 to the beginning of 2009.

* In December 2007, 24% of Americans said they had at some point used the internet on their mobile device.

* By April 2009, 32% of Americans said they had at some point used the internet on their mobile device.

* In December 2007, 11% of Americans said they had yesterday accessed the internet on their mobile.

* By April 2009, 19% of Americans said they had yesterday accessed the internet on their mobile.

Links To HTM and PDF versions of the Full Report available