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Eurobarometer: Romanians, among the most receptive Europeans to the news about the EU and the European Parliament
Television is the main source of news for Europeans, especially for the older generations. European citizens trust traditional media (radio, television or print media) more than online platforms. The news of greatest interest to citizens are national political topics. In Romania, TV has a higher share than the EU average, says the latest Eurobarometer released by the European Parliament on Tuesday.
The survey found out that 72% of respondents have recently read, seen or heard something about the European Union and 57% about the European Parliament and that television dominates as the primary news source (75%), especially in the case of elderly.
Overall, public TV and radio stations are the most trusted news source in the EU (49%), followed by printed press (39%) and private TV and radio stations (27%).
While national political topics interest citizens most (selected by 50% of respondents), European and international affairs (46%) is closely behind, on a par with local news (47%).
Recall on EU news ranges between 57% in France and 90% in Romania, for news on the EP recall varies between 39% in France and 85% in Malta.
As television ranks as the primary news source, particularly for citizens over 55 years old (75%), the online news platforms (43%), radio (39%), and social media platforms and blogs (26%) come next. Printed press ranks fifth with one out of five respondents (21%) citing newspapers and magazines as their primary news source. On the other hand, youngsters are more likely to use social media platforms and blogs to access news (46% of 15-24 year-olds vs 15% of 55+ year-olds).
However, 88% of respondents get at least some news online via their smartphone, computer or laptop. 43% of respondents use the website of the news source (e.g. website of a newspaper) to access news online, and 31% read articles or posts that appear in their online social networks. Accessing news posts via their online social networks is even more important to young people, (43% of 15-24 year-olds vs 24% of 55+ respondents).
Paying for online news content is still rather the exception, as 70% of those who access news online would use only free news content or news services online.