Research

A bipartisan bill now in Congress would give the National Institutes of Health $95 million over five years to fund studies on how media and technology effect children.

As national media organizations contemplate how to mitigate their trust deficit with the American people, a solution emerges from the 2018 Poynter Media Trust Survey: Bag the coverage of President Donald Trump and Congress and the Environmental Protection Agency, and go wall-to-wall on zoning hearings, bus-route changes, liquor-license revocations and softball games. Local news, that is. The survey, after all, shows that people trust sources of local reporting far more than national outlets.

Amid roiling debates about the impact of screen time on teenagers, roughly half of those ages 13 to 17 are themselves worried they spend too much time on their cellphones. Some 52% of US teens report taking steps to cut back on their mobile phone use, and similar shares have tried to limit their use of social media (57%) or video games (58%), a new Pew Research Center survey finds. Fully 72% of teens say they often or sometimes check for messages or notifications as soon as they wake up, while roughly four-in-ten say they feel anxious when they do not have their cellphone with them.

Every year since 2004, Pew Research Center has issued an annual assessment of the state of the news media that tracks key audience and economic indicators for a variety of sectors within the US news media industry. Here are the key findings for 2017:

From Brazil to Italy to Canada, even the most reluctant carriers are now building, including Deutsche Telekom and British Telecom. Credit Suisse believes that for an incumbent, “The cost of building fibre is less than the cost of not building fibre.” 20% growth is common. Telefónica Spain has passed twenty million premises - over 70% - and continues at two million a year. Telefónica Brazil is going from seven million in 2018 to ten million in 2020. China has 328 million connected and added 5M in the month of June.

Privacy and security online continue to be major issues for Americans, according to a National Telecommunications and Information Administration survey conducted by the US Census Bureau. Nearly three-quarters of Internet-using households had significant concerns about online privacy and security risks in 2017, while a third said these worries caused them to hold back from some online activities. About 20 percent said they had experienced an online security breach, identity theft, or a similar crime during the past year.

Some play down the threats to journalists and press freedom. Here’s part of a brief fact list from the nonpartisan Committee to Protect Journalists:

Being a major metropolitan area usually means having top-tier infrastructure, access to technology and other advantages, but that isn’t the case when it comes to mobile network performance, according to a study of the worst and best mobile wireless cities released by RootMetrics.

Best Mobile Wireless Cities: Topping the rankings was Knoxville (TN), the nation’s 73rd ranked metro area in terms of population, followed by St. Louis (MO) (20th in population), Minneapolis (MN) (16th in pop), Allentown (PA) (60th in pop), and Fort Wayne (IN) (118 in pop).

For most Americans, exposure to different content and ideas on social media has not caused them to change their opinions. But a small share of the public – 14% – say they have changed their views about a political or social issue in the past year because of something they saw on social media, according to a Pew Research Center survey of U.S. adults conducted May 29-June 11.

A new report from the American Action Forum questions the economic impact of rural broadband.