A new study reveals that 30% of
Americans get their news on Facebook, and suggests that the social
network drives people to media sites who may not have otherwise done so.
Of that 30%, more than half — 78% — said they click on news links to
media sites after initially logging on for unrelated reasons, such as
checking out friends’ pictures or updating their statuses. In fact, only
16% of Facebook users say that getting news is the primary reason they
log on.
The study, published by the Pew Research
Center on Thursday, found that almost half of American users click on
news in their Facebook feeds. Since 64% of adults in the United States
use Facebook, that means one in three Americans consumes news on
Facebook.
However, only 22% of the 30% who get
their news on Facebook think the site is a useful source for information
about the world, and only 4% of those think Facebook is “the most
important way” to get their news.
“People go to Facebook to share personal
moments — and they discover the news almost incidentally,” Amy
Mitchell, Pew Research Center’s director of journalism research, said in
a statement. “The serendipitous nature of news on Facebook may actually
increase its importance as a source of news and information, especially
among those who do not follow the news closely.”
The study quotes one respondent, who said he believes
“Facebook is a good way to find out news without actually looking for it.”
The importance of the social network also depends on how much of a news junkie the user is.
Among those who click on news links in
their Facebook news feeds, just 38% of heavy news followers think the
social network is “an important way to get the news,” but among those
who follow news “less often,” 47% consider Facebook as an important
source.
On Monday, Facebook announced that it was driving 170% more traffic to media sites this year than in 2012.
This is the first of a series of studies
on social media and news published by Pew in collaboration with the
Knight Foundation. For this study, Pew surveyed 5,173 Americans ages 18
and older.
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