Photos are key for Australian news media

Embargoed until: Publicly released: 2024-07-18 00:01

Australia; International; VIC

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Australian news media are much more focused on photos than elsewhere in the world, according to an Aussie and Chinese comparison of news in the two countries. The researchers analysed 1400 images published in a typical week in 2022 across an urban and regional print and digital outlet in China and two similar outlets in Australia, and interviewed the journalists at those outlets about their image choices. The researchers say the Australian outlets published more images, especially the regional outlet and unlike the Chinese media, rarely published a story without an image. Just over 75% of Aussie news images were of people, the researchers say, compared to around 40% for the Chinese images. From the interviews, the researchers say it appears Aussie news staff are encouraged to focus on images because they drive clicks, whereas Chinese news staff can face more challenges using pictures of political figures, and their audiences tended to care more about the text in a story.