Online News Exposure and Trust in the Mainstream Media: Exploring Possible Associations

Based on the premise that online journalism offers readers with some features that may serve as an alternative to traditional journalism, this article explores possible associations between mistrust in mainstream news media and consumption of online news. Results from a telephone survey and an online survey demonstrate that the association between mistrust of mainstream news and exposure to online news in general is negative. But whereas mainstream exposure is related to trust in media, exposure to nonmainstream sites is related to media skepticism. The findings also shed some light on the factors contributing to audience trust in online news. Keywords trust-in-media, online news exposure, media skepticism, selective exposure In recent years, audience trust in the institutions of the mainstream media has been fading in many developed countries (see Bennet, Staci, & Flickinger, 2001; Cappella & Jamieson, 1997; Kiousis, 2001; Kohut & Toth, 1998). This study explores a possi-ble consequence of news media skepticism, namely, its impact on audience news exposure patterns. It is hypothesized that people try to attend to what they trust. When they mistrust the media, they seek alternatives. One important alternative to the main-stream media is found in online news sources. Thus, media skeptics are expected to have less mainstream, but more nonmainstream, online news exposure in their media diets compared to their nonskeptical counterparts