News Values

News stories are what keeps the world up to date with the current on-goings in society. But how do these news stories work? How do you differentiate between a happy story and a sad one? And most importantly: how does an editor decide which story is the most important?

This is where news values come into the picture (or story…). News values come in many different shapes and sizes (Okay. They don’t really, but bear with me.) The most common types of news values you will find in your newspaper are as follows: impact, audience identification, pragmatics and source influence. However, these can be broken down even further into smaller, more specific categories. These can be anything from celebrity, human interest (which is actually a pretty broad category in itself), all the way to terrorism. Depending on which news value the story has will determine the importance of said story.

One definition of a news value is: “The degree of prominence a media outlet gives to a story, and the attention that is paid by an audience.” A good example of this is September 11. All over the newspapers, news shows and internet forums, everyone was reporting on the tragedy that had occurred and what was going to happen afterwards. This is because a lot of people were affected by this and many more were still in danger.

Another factor in what deems the importance of a particular story is location. For example, unless it was going to have a significant impact, an Australian newspaper wouldn’t report on a robbery in a small American town, and visa versa. An Australian newspaper would, however, print a story about a robbery that happened in a small Australian town. This is a part of the rule “If it’s local, it leads”. The other part of the rule being, “If it bleeds, it leads”, meaning that if a mass shooting happens, or a horrific car accident takes place, it usually ends up on the front page somewhere, or everywhere.

Finally, I will leave you with this quote from Arthur Evelyn Waugh whilst you ponder on what you believe to be newsworthy. “News is what a chap who doesn't care much about anything wants to read. And it's only news until he's read it. After that it's dead.”