Newsroom Ideological Diversity and the Ideological Sorting of Journalists†

• Published date: 01 December 2023
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/10659129231182145
• Author: Hans J. G. Hassell,Matthew R. Miles,Brenna Morecraft
• Date: 01 December 2023
• Subject Matter: Articles

Article

Political Research Quarterly

2023, Vol. 76(4) 1944–1958

© The Author(s) 2023

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DOI: 10.1177/10659129231182145

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Newsroom Ideological Diversity and the

Ideological Sorting of Journalists

†

Hans J. G. Hassell

1

, Matthew R. Miles

2

, and Brenna Morecraft

3

Abstract

In efforts to curb ideological bias in the news, citizens, academics, and journalists have highlighted the importance of

newsroom ideological diversity. Using a large-scale survey of newspaper political journalists in the United States, we

examine the diversity of ideological perspectives of political journalists across newspapers and communities and how

ideological misalignments with the newsroom and the local community relate to those journalis ts’employment decisions.

We f‌ind political newspaper reporters regularly work for newspapers and in communities that do not mirror their own

ideological perspectives. However, by following newspaper political journalists’employment decisions over a three-year

period, we also f‌ind that the ideological differences between those journalists and the newsroom where they work (but

not ideological difference with the local community) are related to an increase in journalists’desire to change jobs and in

the likelihood they will actually seek other employment, either within journalism or outside of the profession.

Keywords

ideological sorting, media, newspapers, journalists

American polarization is partly being fed by an increasingly

polarized press…Rather than shuttling off conservative

[journalists] to their own partisan sites, a much more de-

sirable and healthy solution is for legacy and new news

organizations to f‌ind ways to achieve better ideological

balance.

-Skip Foster, Former Publisher, Tallahassee

Democrat (July 17, 2020)

Because the ability to inf‌luence and frame the political

agenda grants the media considerable power (King,

Schneer, and White 2017;McCombs and Shaw 1972),

ideological bias in the media is a signif‌icant concern to

scholars, journalists, and citizens (Groseclose and Milyo

2005;Ladd 2012). These individuals have called for a

greater diversity of ideological preferences and perspec-

tives within newsrooms as a means to reduce media slant

(Clark 2016;Foster 2020) because who is in the news-

room affects news content (White 1950;Wihby et al.

2019).

1

Specif‌ically, journalist ideology inf‌luences the

sources journalists utilize (Gans 2004;Groseclose and

Milyo 2005;Schudson 1989;Shoemaker and Reese 1996;

Wolfgang and Vos. 2021) and ultimately the slant of the

news content produced (Patterson and Donsbagh 1996;

White 1950;Wihbey et al. 2019).

Yet,despite the importanceof a diversit y of viewpoints

within newsrooms because of its potential effect on news

coverage and media slant and its perceived ability to

reduce media bias, we know little about ideological di-

versity in newsrooms (the extent to which journalists work

at newspapers whose ideological perspectives do no align

with their own) or whether newspapers face such prob-

lems because journalists with views that are not aligned

with the dominant view of the newsroom are inclined to

exit for other employment. While scholars have examined

extensively (and disagree about) whether and to what

1

Department of Political Science, Florida State University, Tallahassee,

FL, USA

2

Department of History, Geography, and Political Science, Brigham

Young University –Idaho, Rexburg, ID, USA

3

College of Law, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL, USA

†

Replication data and code is available on an ad hoc basis by request due

to concerns about subject anonymity. Contact the corresponding author

for data and to arrange means to maintain subject anonymity.

Corresponding Author:

Hans J. G. Hassell, Department of Political Science, Florida State

University, 600 W. College Ave., Bellamy 531B, Tallahassee, FL

32306, USA.

Email: hans.hassell@fsu.edu