“The message is: Now is the time for leadership,” said ASNE Human Resources Committee Chair Gene Foreman, who is deputy editor of The Philadelphia Inquirer. “We need to motivate the growing group of journalists over 40 and figure out how to attract more young people into the business.” Other items of concern: the need for more one-on-one communications between supervisors and journalists, Repetitive Stress Injury and its pervasiveness, and the ever-present threat of career-burnout.

According to “The Newspaper Journalists of the ‘90s,” a study released April 10 by ASNE, newspaper journalists are:

• Becoming more diverse: Although journalists older than 30 are still predominantly male, people hired under age 30 are split 50-50 male and female and journalists are more likely to be people of color now, and the younger they are, the more likely that is.
• Older, as a group, than they were in 1988. About 69 percent are 30 or older, up from 59 percent nine years ago.
• More politically independent than in the 1988 survey. Although it has long been documented that journalists tend to label themselves as liberal, this survey found more independents — almost a quarter of all journalists surveyed labeled themselves independent — and fewer conservatives than in 1988.

The 62-page report is based on data analyzed by Paul S. Voakes assistant professor of journalism at Indiana University and the members of the ASNE Human Resources Committee. More than 1,000 randomly selected journalists at U.S. daily newspapers responded to questions in the fall of 1996 about their work, their aspirations and themselves.

One of the findings is that large majorities of journalists accept some of the concepts of “public journalism” or “civic journalism,” the subject of intense debate in journalism circles.

Reporting on alternative solutions to community problems and pointing out the tradeoffs involved was approved of by 96 percent of respondents. Journalists also overwhelmingly supported (by 88 percent) developing enterprise stories supported by editorials to help these communities move toward solutions.

A “civic journalism” idea that is more of a break with traditional journalism was also supported by smaller margins. Polling the public to determine the most pressing community issues and then trying to get candidates to focus on these issues was supported by 71 percent of respondents. Conducting town meetings to discover key issues and then following up on those issues and offering solutions was supported by 68 percent.

Just over half of the journalists surveyed ranked their newspaper as “good” and the overwhelming majority believe that their paper is either improving or holding its own. More than 90 percent believe their newspaper is usually or occasionally interesting to read.

Most journalists surveyed say that their newsroom budgets have declined compared to five years ago, and most — 71 percent — believe that their newsroom budgets are at least somewhat inadequate to cover the news.

More than a quarter of respondents had personally experienced Repetitive Stress Injury, the scourge of the computer era. More journalists at large dailies than small dailies had experienced RSI (32 percent vs. 15 percent). The type of work done is also a factor: 34 percent of copy editors had experienced it while only 16 percent of photographer/artists had. In addition, women were more likely than men to have experienced it (35 percent vs. 23 percent). On the positive side, the majority of respondents (61 percent) thought their newspaper was doing a good or excellent job of responding to RSI.

Other trends revealed in the report:

• Editorial writers are the happiest newspaper journalists while copy editors were the least satisfied.
• About 30 percent of the overall workforce uses the Internet, with the youngest journalists leading the way (about 71 percent of 30-and-under journalists are “keenly interested” or regularly using the Net.)

The project was managed by the ASNE Human Resources Committee.

Copies of the report are available for $9 each. To order send a check to ASNE Foundation, Publications Fulfillment, 11690B Sunrise Valley Drive, Reston VA 20191-1409. There is a 20 percent discount on orders of 20 or more. A version of the report will be available on this site.

ASNE, with 870 members, is an organization of the main editors of daily newspapers in the United States and Canada. Founded in 1922, ASNE’s principal purpose is to serve as a medium for exchange of ideas and the professional growth and development of its members.