Media’s Gender Gap: Investigating relationships between women’s news production and consumption

Women are underrepresented in newsrooms and are less likely to read political and international news. I investigated the relationship between women's news production and consumption and published my findings with the Media Impact Project, part of USC Annenberg's Norman Lear Center. 

 Coverage:

American Press Institute: Need to know

The media gender gap is well established, according to Alyssa Zeisler, women are underrepresented in newsrooms and leadership roles are primarily held by and most frequently filled by men. She says there exists another equally well established but less discussed gender gap: women tend to read less political and international news than men. This gender gap in news consumption has both commercial implications (audience size and revenues) and editorial implications for news producers.

Mediashift: The Media Industry’s #MeToo Moment

USC Annenberg’s Media Impact Project study just released a study entitled “Media’s Gender Gap: Investigating relationships between women’s news production and consumption.” Unsurprisingly, it confirmed that women are underrepresented in newsrooms. Significantly, though, the report also found that news organizations with a higher share of women writing the news and in leadership positions boast a higher share of women in their audience. The report’s author, Alyssa Zeisler, who is an engagement strategist at the Financial Times, went on to draw the conclusion that employing women in these roles would likely lead to a more informed and engaged public and would also offer revenue opportunities for media companies through audience growth.

 

The AIJO Project:

I was a mentor for the AIJO project, housed in the JournalsimAI initiative at the London School of Economics. The team was made up  of a group of representatives from eight major news organizations across the world brought together to focus on explo…

I was a mentor for the AIJO project, housed in the JournalsimAI initiative at the London School of Economics. The team was made up of a group of representatives from eight major news organizations across the world brought together to focus on explore How AI could be used to understand, identify and mitigate newsroom biases.

 

Additional work and commentary on newsroom diversity:

  • 📢Panelist @ ONA (The XX Factor: How News Outlets Can Better Engage With Female Audiences)