The number of Americans who follow the news closely remains under 40 percent, according to a new report from the Pew Research Center.
Just 38% of Americans say they closely follow the news, according to the study, which was based on data from 2022. That finding echoes the 2021 results, which found that 37% of Americans were paying close attention to the news.
“The decrease has been particularly steep among Republicans, who also have become much less likely to trust information from national news organizations in recent years,” Pew researcher Naomi Forman-Katz wrote.
An increasing percentage of Americans say they only occasionally check the news, the study found.
“A rising share of Americans say they follow the news only now and then. While 12% of adults said this in 2016, that figure increased to 19% by 2022,” according to Forman-Katz.
Americans 18 to 29 were the least engaged with the news, with 19% saying they closely follow it, according to the study.
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