Abstract (eng)
This thesis investigates the news consumption of young people and their interest in politics.
Specifically, it's about how they consume news and political content and what they think
about it. Do traditional media such as television and newspapers still play a role in digitalised
everyday life? Do young people believe in and trust blindly the information they read, or do
they also reflect and think critically?
In an online survey with 169 participants and 17 individual interviews, students from public
general or vocational high schools in Burgenland and Vienna were interviewed.
Subsequently, the evaluation in the SPSS as well as the transcription of the individual
interviews and their analysis with the help of the summarizing content analysis of Philipp
Mayring (2015) followed.
Overall results
Most of the interviewed young people want to know about the most important news and
some of them find it very important to be informed. Despite digitalisation and the
smartphone usage, traditional media still play an important role.
The respondents show a critical reception in their news consumption, because more than
half question the content they read. Therefore, they sometimes feel insecure or believe that
many messages are twisted or misrepresented.
Almost 60% of the students surveyed are interested in politics. As the students mature, they
show more interest. Male students trust more in politics and also consume significantly more
news than female students do. Other studies have also shown that politics are often
associated with negative terms. Young people are of the belief, that in politics, people often
lie. Nevertheless, it is considered by the young people an important topic for our future.