Credibility in and of live blogs
Live blogs provide immediate, minute-by-minute reporting on current developments. Think of political debates, a competition or a terrorist attack. Much is still unknown, but it is already being reported. What do journalists do to make their live blog credible? And does the public also recognize and acknowledge these attempts?
Objective
The aim of this research is to use various research methods to investigate how journalists maximize credibility in and of live blogs and to what extent these attempts have an effect on the public. Four studies were conducted for this purpose: a quantitative content analysis of live blogs; interviews with live blog creators; focus groups with users of live blogs and a survey among media users during corona.
Results
The research shows that journalists, as with other genres, maximize credibility in live blogs by using mainly formal sources. These sources are mainly quoted. Uncertainties that are relevant are presented through 'hedges' - using language ('possible', perhaps', 'conceivable'). Although the live blog genre is relatively new, we see strong similarities with other journalistic genres when it comes to credibility. The audience of live blogs are very critical, but too much news junkies to dismiss live blogs as unreliable: they actively fix errors and continue to read the live blogs.
Duration
01 November 2018 - 01 April 2024
Approach
This research used different methods: reconstruction interviews with makers; focus groups and surveys with users and quantitative content analysis of a selection of Dutch live blogs. These methods led to a genre analysis of live blogs.
HU researchers involved in the research
Collaboration with knowledge partners
This research is being conducted under the auspices of Prof. J. de Jong and W. Koetsenruijter PhD, both from Leiden University.
