By Dr. William Oliver Hedgepeth
Faculty Member, Transportation and Logistics Management
“Who cares about the news? Who cares about the facts? Do you really care?” This was how I began my presentation earlier this month at the Richmond-Times Dispatch newspaper’s 69th Public Square. We were there to discuss whether people still trust the news media.
Most of the 90-minute town hall-style discussion centered on how to trust the information that is presented to us as facts in the news media. Many of the participants that Thursday afternoon were retirees. But scattered among them were some young people under age 24. So I chose a different approach to my presentation.
Not knowing what would happen, I threw out the idea that age was a factor in determining who believed the news was factual or not, whether the news was real or simply entertainment.
Some heads nodded yes, some shook no in response to my opening queries. I pressed on as any professor would in uncharted waters. I said, “I go to alternative sources for alternative facts.” That drew broad laughter. I had them. My point might have merit, at least for this crowd.
Then I said, “I read your newspaper every day, and [also] The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times. Trying to find out what the truth is. It matters to me, at 72. But a lot of my students — and it’s a small amount — that are under 30, don’t seem to care. That’s what I’m finding out. It’s just one little data source, and it’s not a national thing.”
Age Affects How Various Age Groups Regard the News
A young college student, Michael Johnson, was the first to respond. He said, “As a millennial, I do think that there is some age to it. It takes a certain amount of skill to get through…the colorful writing.”
Tanner Toy, age 20, stated, “I think it’s hard enough to get people my age to care about these facts.” Toy challenged our host newspaper to “streamline the facts, so that we know the whole story, so we don’t have to keep searching.”
Their opinions were just two data points from this unscientific classroom-like experiment. I am not certain that age is the factor, but I do believe there is an element of knowledge and skill that comes with age and creates an anticipation of truth in journalism.
Interestingly, the first two comments came from the youngest members of the audience, not from the more seasoned attendees. They would be the baby boomers, born between 1946 and 1964 or the Gen Xers, born between 1965 and the early 1980s. Beyond those two age groups, there is some confusion about who makes up the much-maligned millennials.
It’s generally agreed that millennials were born between the early 1980s and around 2004. So we are talking about a population group ranging in age now from 13 to their late 30s.
Millennials Want ‘Instant Riches’ and ‘Bubble Gum’ News
A few days later at the dentist’s office, I watched an early morning TV news program with my dental hygienist, Caroline. She was 28.
In her opinion, millennials want instant riches without doing any work. She said that was not her.
As for the facts and alternative facts on the news, she classified all of it as “bubble gum” news. She believes it’s all entertainment news now.
When I wrote “Millennials Are Reshaping the Workplace,” I quoted a 21-year-old college student. This student said, “We millennials are too self-centered and all about ‘me’.”
As a teacher, I thought millennials might differ from other generations by just one factor, age. I now believe there is more to it than that factor especially because of millennials’ wide age spread.
Age and Experience Are Filters When Sorting Truth from Fiction
One revelation came from a third participant in the Richmond Times-Dispatch forum. Elaine Quinby, a septuagenarian, stood up following the two college students and proclaimed, “Our age group filters [the media] through all of our history.”
As a member of the same generation, I can attest that we do use that filter. We use that filter when we read a newspaper story, watch TV news, or hear President Trump or his critics say something that seems to us not quite 100% factual.
Quinby provided another variable to age as a prime factor in sorting facts from alternative facts in the media. Millennials did not have our filter of being taught “civics the way we learned it,” she said.
Academics Should Recognize Age and Experience Differences When Designing Curricula
So there I was, a research professor who threw out a line of thinking as bait for knowledge fishing. The original bait was my statement that age was a key factor in measuring two groups of news readers: millennials and baby boomers. It appears, however, that education too could be an element in our ability to assess truth and the news media’s trustworthiness.
Perhaps as teachers we ought to consider that filter too when we determine how to teach our students. Our students range in age from 20 to 70, and their expertise relies on a combination of life experience and different educational curricula.
My dental hygienist, Caroline, was right. Bubble gum news is here. Educators should study this new phenomenon to identify its key factors and core assumptions. The results would help define current cultural aspects for improving interaction with millennials.
There is also a message here for newsmakers to rethink how they collect and package the news.
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