Evaluating subjectivity in digital news stories

The increasing popularity of social media as a platform for news distribution has changed the way news stories are both written and consumed. Recent studies show that social media engendered novel types of digital news discourse that are characterized by increased subjectivity. However, it remains unclear how exactly subjectivity is expressed in news stories on social media as compared to journalistic websites, and more importantly, how it influences online processing and offline evaluation of news stories, especially among different literacy groups of readers. This research project aims to unravel the relationship between subjectivity, digital news medium, and literacy level, by investigating processing and appreciation of subjectivity in online news narratives, comparing news on social media platforms and journalistic news websites while considering the impact of individual differences in literacy skills. This goal will be achieved by a combination of coprus studies, online crowdsourcing experiments and eye-tracking experiments on English and Russian media.