Ori Tenenboim

Over 60% of surveyed Gen Z members in Canada say they seek out entertainment over news when using the internet, compared to just over half of millennial and Gen X members. Although research has examined young people’s content preferences, it has yet to fully explore how the tension between journalistic presentation formats and digital media presentation formats may be creating barriers for youth engagement with news. This research project takes a qualitative approach to examine what news presentation formats Gen Z members perceive as more engaging or less engaging, and why this perception exists. Drawing on group interviews with 36 students (18-25 years old) in Vancouver, card sort tasks and open discussion questions in groups uncovered the experiences, perceptions, and peer norms that underlie Gen Z members’ engagement with different news presentation formats. Findings highlight that a high-choice media environment coupled with blurred lines between entertainment and news delivery platforms has led these Gen Z members to construct new rituals around news consumption, which include the reconceptualization of news being something separate from journalism. Uncovering this perception has both theoretical and practical implications. Theoretically, these findings support the efficacy of an integrated theoretical approach to youth news engagement, which includes both preference and infrastructural journalistic perspectives, as well as uses and gratifications theory and psychosocial developmental theory. Practically, this research provides a new understanding of methods for engaging youth, including the addition of peer-to-peer presentations of news, altering presentations to match the brevity and colloquiality of social media, and facilitating youth’s agency in deciding when to seek these news media. This new understanding is crucial in a media environment where various actors and content types compete for people’s attention.

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It is known that natural disasters amplify economic and social realities, exposing the vulnerability that many island nations face. Although journalists report on such disasters, at some point the news coverage may shift focus from the disaster event and its impact to which celebrities are offering aid. This study investigates how celebrities were framed by journalists during the relief efforts after Hurricane Dorian in The Bahamas in 2019. Drawing on framing theory and a qualitative textual analysis of 50 online articles published in English-language media outlets, a key news frame was identified: Celebrity Response, which emphasizes celebrity representation in a news story as the solution to the issue or problem. The study suggests that this frame reflects neocolonialist ideological patterns within the news media stories of Hurricane Dorian celebrity-initiated relief. The textual analysis also shows that four key framing mechanisms were used by journalists to construct the frame: dramatic language, which reveals how a text can impact the meaning of a news story; celebrity-centric headlines, which show how an important component in the news story structure can translate celebrity relevance as paramount in post-disaster relief; social media as validation, where social media references are used as content to validate the celebrity as a source; and source elevation, where the celebrity is granted higher placement and meaning in the news story as opposed to those experiencing the impact. The findings of this study help understand the interdependence between the ‘who’ that is impacted and the ‘who’ that is elevated in the journalism structure, exposing both a Western and neocolonialist perspective when it comes to natural disaster news reporting about post-disaster relief efforts in a developing nation. Implications for journalism studies and journalism practice are discussed.

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