A cross-regional comparison of selected European newspaper journalists and their evolving attitudes towards the internet - including a single-country focus on the UK

Abstract

This study approaches how journalists in the United Kingdom might compare with individuals working in print journalism in 10 other European countries, to assess role perceptions and beliefs in relation to the internet. The continental Europeans were grouped into north and south, and the UK set was independently compared with each. In all, 270 journalists across 44 newspapers in Europe gave scaled reactions to a questionnaire about their role conceptions, the internet, and the future. It appears the sampled UK journalists, despite some historical conceptions about the distinctively separate evolution of their press, conform strikingly with their European counterparts but in a specific and patterned way: the UK journalists align with their counterparts from the north of Europe but have significant differences to those in the south. The principal ingredient of the division is the degree to which the journalists find the internet useful, positive and a worthwhile extension of their working opportunities. The findings conform in some respects to academic studies taking a historical and cultural approach to comparative journalism.