Why Americans Don’t Trust the Media

Abstract

An alarming number of Americans no longer trust the media to report the news fairly—a serious problem in a democracy that depends so much on news organizations to inform its citizens. As a first step toward explaining this phenomenon, this study explores various factors that explain individual-level variation in media trust. One key factor appears to be trust in government, suggesting that the media’s lowly stature may stem more from general political malaise than from the many shortcomings of contemporary news coverage. Interestingly, trust in the media is particularly low among conservative Republicans, especially those who listen to political talk radio. For these Americans, perhaps the problem with the media rests on what they see as a liberal bias, not declining journalistic standards.