Journalism Versus Churnalism: How News Factors in Press Releases Affect Journalistic Processing of Ocean Plastic Research in Newspapers Globally

This study evaluates the impact of news factors in press releases sent from scientific organizations on the representation of ocean plastic research in newspapers. We tracked 84 press releases discussing peer-reviewed ocean plastic studies, published between 2017 and 2021 on EurekAlert! and identified their presence in 495 English-language newspapers worldwide. Text comparison showed that press releases contribute highly to the construction of newspaper articles, with copied text segments in over half of the articles. News factors highlighting the prestige of the scientific study, like research published in high-impact journals or conducted by elite researchers were indicators of high newspaper coverage, as were the news factors bad news, magnitude, and social/economic relevance. Scientific press releases usually provide essential details about research, such as sample characteristics, research sites, and methods. However, funding information and research limitations were only marginally present. This study showed that providing research details does not reduce newsworthiness, instead sometimes even increasing it. Providing research details in press releases can influence journalists’ understanding and evaluation of the scientific study and thereby their decision to report. Hence, to assess the newsworthiness of scientific research, we propose that news factor analysis should include research details.