News Values

Andrew Boyd, Author of ‘Broadcast Journalism: Techniques of Radio and Television News’ has been cited as saying that, "News journalism has a broadly agreed set of values, often referred to as 'newsworthiness'...”

But what are these values? Julian Assange has previously said that ‘If journalism is good, it is controversial, by its nature.’ But controversy isn’t the only type of news – what are other things that make something newsworthy? Aside from following the inverted pyramid principle to write a story well, what are other factors that make a great news article?

In 1965, Johan Galtung and Mari Ruge conducted a study to establish what these principles are. That is, how we decide what is newsworthy, and what is therefore published in newspapers or broadcast as news. They discovered that newsworthiness can be divided into a set of principles, and the more principles that apply to the news story, the more likely it will be published or deemed as news worthy. Galtung and Ruge created a list of these factors, as well as three hypotheses as to how they work.

Galtung and Ruge decided that the following were the newsworthy principles:

1. ·      Negativity – Bad News. Anything involving death, destruction, disasters and so on.
2. ·      Proximity – Anything local. For example, The January floods were highly covered in Queensland where the event impacted locals.
3. ·      Recency – As soon as it happens. Now with convergent media this is more prevalent than ever, but if not careful can mean poorly researched/written journalism.
4. ·      Continuity – Something with continuing value such as a sport event. For example, continued coverage for the course of the Olympic games.
5. ·      Currency – Stories that have been in the public eye for a long time but are still current. For example, Continual news articles on the taboo abortion debate.
6. ·      Uniqueness – A story that captures a unique event, for example, ‘sloth learns to waterski’ would be a unique news subject.
7. ·      Simplicity – Stories that are straightforward, Not complex.
8. ·      Personality – To do with a person, common news value of human-interest stories.
9. ·      Expectedness – Does the story conform to previous conceptions about a topic? If so, it falls under this category.
10. ·      Elite Nations/People – Well known people or Nations. For example, What outrageous shenanigans Kim Jong Un/North Korea has been up to. Celebrity news also falls under this category.
11. ·      Size – The bigger the impact of the story. Can be impact to human life, business, politics, etc.
12. ·      Exclusivity – The first publication to break a story. In a world which news is available at any time and is constantly updated, exclusivity is a major news value.

Galtung and Ruge’s hypotheses state the three defining factors to which determine whether something is news worthy. The more of the aforementioned newsworthy factors an event fulfills, the possibility that it will become news is greatly increased. This is referred to as the additivity hypothesis. The factors will tend to exclude each other (this is the complementarity hypothesis) and the exclusion hypothesis states that events that satisfy none or very few factors it may not become news instead winding up in the cuttings on the editorial room floor.

Not all places in the world will we find certain things worthy of news. News values are also determined by culture and what any given society rates as valuable information. However, the above values were the first real basis of how we determine whether or not something is newsworthy and at least some of them should apply anywhere in the world. Since their original study in 1965, Galtung and Ruge’s newsworthy principles have been revised and formed a basis for many other principles written by other media commentators. As well as some of the original values, Golding and Elliot’s news values include ‘visual attractiveness’ which has become relevant due to the shift to online media and video journalism, O’Neill & Harcup officially state ‘entertainment’ as a news value, and McGregor added ‘celebrification of the journalist’ (although I am yet to see that last one when the journalist is still alive, which is a bit disconcerting).

All of these other news values are valid points, and all can be applied to news today. Like Galtung and Ruge suggest, the more news values a story fits – the better. However, as journalists we do not own the audience so we cannot actually solely decide what is relevant news for our audience. We must be careful to be a mere channel from which information can flow through to our audience. We must not let our own (personal or commercial) bias influence this.

Due to the internet and social networking sites, the audience can effectively seek or publish their own news. Bill Kovach, American journalist and former Washington bureau chief of The New York Times said ‘If we're going to live as we are in a world of supply and demand, then journalists had better find a way to create a demand for good journalism.’ In order to ensure that we as journalists remain relevant we need to maintain high standards of journalism. Our news values need to remain high. Our accountability, reliability, fact checking, in-depth research and accuracy need to be constantly vigilant, otherwise we risk destroying our own media world and careers.  We must avoid bias at all costs. Otherwise the journalist in todays’ world of new media may not survive.