As CNTI discussed in the findings of the focus groups, keeping informed about the issues and events one cares about is hard work today. With so many options to choose from, people have to make choices constantly — to a degree that, as much research has shown, often leaves people overwhelmed. CNTI dug into how people make these choices, what helps them and where the hurdles are.

All in all, people feel pretty good about their own capacity to keep informed. Majorities everywhere except the U.S. feel positive about their ability to keep informed; in the U.S. that falls to 40% while about half feel neutral. When asked about four potential challenges they might face, knowing who or what to trust ranks highest across all four countries. That challenge conflicts with their greatest priorities: getting news quickly, seeing different sources, being able to go more or less in depth and getting news from professional journalists. 

It is worth considering these findings alongside the 2024 Digital News Report, which found that across 47 countries, people’s top three concerns in deciding which outlets to trust are whether they are transparent about how the news is made, have high journalistic standards and “represent people like me fairly” — with strikingly little variation by age, gender or political orientation.

People feel good about their ability to stay informed — except in the U.S.

In three of the four countries, a majority of people generally feel positive about their ability to keep informed. That falls to 40% in the U.S. where the plurality (51%) say they feel neutral. Still, Americans are about five times as likely to be positive than negative. Australians stand out for a different reason. Even as a majority (59%) feel positive, about a third (34%) feel negative, far more than in any other country, where that sentiment is expressed by just 8%.

People also seem to be consuming a fair amount of journalism. About half of Americans (52%) and South Africans (50%) report reading, watching or listening to five or more pieces of journalism a week, as do about two-thirds of Brazilians (64%) and three-quarters of Australians (75%). This is a fairly subjective question (what constitutes “a piece” or “journalism” is up to the respondent), but it is interesting to see the high levels of consumption most people report. Future research efforts could use the same measures to compare this assessment about journalism with other kinds of information or content.

Among the challenges to staying informed, knowing who to trust ranks highest across the board

Among four potential challenges to getting and staying informed, “knowing who or what to trust” ranks first. More than three-quarters of people in Australia (79%), Brazil (90%) and the U.S. (80%) say this is at least somewhat of a challenge, and nearly as many people in South Africa (71%) say the same. Brazilians are more likely to see this as a big challenge than others.

Slightly smaller majorities in all four countries also say that the “availability of high-quality reporting” is at least somewhat of a challenge.

Half or more (53-70%) in all four countries also see “choosing among all the sources” as at least somewhat of a challenge. Pluralities in both Brazil (39%) and South Africa (32%) see this as a big challenge, while many fewer Australians (13%) and Americans (19%) do. 

These three challenges all highlight the difficulty of staying informed in a high-choice environment, mirroring insights from earlier focus groups, in which participants described easy access to abundant information but challenges in deciding how to focus their attention on the deluge of news and information available to them. They often described referencing multiple sources on a single topic in order to verify information, add depth or seek out additional perspectives. For many in our focus groups, the challenge was less about having enough choice and more about how to integrate diverse — and sometimes contradictory — sources into their media habits and their understanding of issues and events. 

On the other hand, there are much bigger differences in technological barriers to staying informed. Pluralities in Brazil (41%) and South Africa (35%) say “having technology that works” is a big challenge — two to three times as many people as in Australia (16%) and the U.S. (13%). In fact, a strong majority in Brazil (68%) and a smaller majority in South Africa (56%) say that technology is at least somewhat of a challenge, while close to four-in-ten Australians (39%) and Americans (37%) agree.

People across all four countries share many priorities in getting informed but differ when it comes to social aspects of news

When presented with six to choose from, people are consistent across all four countries in how they prioritize factors in getting informed. Of those six factors, getting the news quickly, seeing news from many different sources, going more or less in-depth on a story and getting news from professional journalists are viewed as at least somewhat important by sizable majorities in every country (73-91%). Notably, each of these four factors is very important to strong majorities of South Africans (66-79%) and majorities of Brazilians (63-65%) — often twice the percentage of Australians and Americans (31-45%).

The shared priorities reinforce the results of CNTI’s focus group conversations, in which participants across countries described timeliness as one of the most important qualities of news (especially compared with journalism). Providing relevant information quickly is a primary responsibility of news. And many people actively take control of the information they consume in response to the challenges: they curate their feeds, use social platforms to search for new information and cross-reference between multiple sources.

Larger differences arise between countries about the importance of being able to engage with others and feeling a personal connection to the source of news. South Africans and Brazilians report being able to engage with others as very important more than twice as often (77% and 64% respectively) as Australians (28%) and Americans (13%). A sizable minority of Americans (40%) do find engaging with others at least somewhat important, as do a majority (57%) of Australians. In the U.S. in particular, it is interesting to consider these findings alongside increasing reports of loneliness and social disconnection and extreme political polarization, which many Americans blame on the news media.

A similar pattern holds for feeling a personal connection to the source of news.¹ Many more Brazilians and South Africans said this factor was important than Australians or Americans.

Among those who say there is a difference between journalism and news, journalism contains more opinion — but also more depth

When asked whether journalism is distinct from news, we see alignment between the same groups of countries: strong majorities (65%) in both the U.S. and Australia say there is a difference, while people in Brazil (54%) and South Africa (40%) are less certain.

In an open-ended follow-up question for those who see a difference, there was tension between two overarching themes across all four countries:²

1. If news is simply what happened, respondents say, journalism is more detailed, in-depth or investigative. 
2. At the same time, many people say that journalism adds a layer of opinion or bias. 

These responses share an understanding of journalism as something that brings in analysis and context to make sense of what is happening, but differ in whether they find that lens valuable or not. As one Australian respondent wrote, “For me news is factual whereas journalism is providing context and analysis and accurate reporting of the facts.” For this person, journalism adds value to facts. The contrasting view is epitomized by a respondent from Brazil, who said, “Actually, journalism isn’t reporting the news anymore, it’s broadcasting the news biased by the interests of the company they work for.” This response also suggests that journalism has not always been this way; instead, journalism once reported the news but no longer does so.

In our earlier focus groups, we observed that participants most often defined journalism by its positive qualities. Where focus group participants discussed bias or opinion in journalism, they often saw these traits as evidence of a flawed product, rather than an intrinsic quality of journalism. Sometimes they even considered biased or opinionated journalism to be “fake news,” even when the facts were not incorrect. This tension — in which the public values and desires in-depth, investigative or well-researched information, but is skeptical of analysis that carries even a whiff of opinion or bias — is a critical one for newsrooms to consider in an era of declining trust and relevance.