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A Study Into the Value Placed on Numeracy As Symbolic Capital Within the Journalistic Field

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A Study Into the Value Placed on Numeracy As Symbolic Capital Within the Journalistic Field Steve Harrison A STUDY INTO THE VALUE PLACED ON NUMERACY AS SYMBOLIC CAPITAL WITHIN THE JOURNALISTIC FIELD A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements of Liverpool John Moores University for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Submission date: November 2020 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I wish to acknowledge my current and previous Directors of Studies Dr Rex Li and Prof. Chris Frost and my supervision team, along with colleagues and friends at Liverpool John Moores University, for their advice and encouragement. I have benefitted greatly from conversations with them on matters specific and general. Thanks are due to Numeracy journal editors Len Vacher and Nathan D. Grawe and to the readers and referees of sections of this thesis for their forbearance and suggestions, some of which have been incorporated into this project, much to its benefit. Any errors or oversights in the following are of course entirely my own. On a personal note, I would like to thank my parents for their unstinting support, and my partner Craig for his patience (and countless cups of tea and coffee) over the seven years during which this project has come to fruition. 1 ABSTRACT Journalists need a clear understanding of numbers and to be comfortable communicating them if they are to perform their role of informing the public and holding power to account. That is because numbers are at the heart of almost every topic of public interest: from health, wellbeing and politics to sport, the economy and business. Yet the popular image of the journalist is that of a barely-numerate wordsmith, at home with prose but bewildered by percentages. If true, that is damaging to public discourse, both in terms of what is and is not reported, and how effectively it is communicated. This research project proceeds from the observation that journalists have a “numeracy deficit” when it comes to writing with and about numbers, and it analyses this deficit in an original manner by drawing on Bourdieu’s concepts of the journalistic field, symbolic capital and habitus, employing these as the basis for a fresh understanding of the topic. By comparing journalism students with statistics students, the role of habitus and cultural capital is invoked to theorise how the development of journalism students’ numeracy skills is inhibited. A numeracy audit of UK newspapers illustrates common errors when reporting on stories which involve quantitative data, and it is argued these arise in large part because numeracy is not valued within the journalistic field to the extent that literacy is. Case studies were critically analysed to explore the practical consequences of an inadequate level of numeracy on the quality of journalism. The findings have been supplemented by interviews with authoritative figures within the profession. By placing this topic for the first time within the context of field theory, it is argued that a solution to journalism’s numeracy deficit does not lie in training alone, as traditionally argued, but requires a transformation of the journalistic field itself. 2 CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ......................................................................................................... 1 ABSTRACT ............................................................................................................................... 2 CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................ 5 Research motivation ............................................................................................................... 5 Views from the experts ........................................................................................................ 13 News media and trust ........................................................................................................... 19 The business of news............................................................................................................ 25 Structure of the thesis ........................................................................................................... 28 CHAPTER TWO: HISTORICAL TRAJECTORY OF NUMERACY IN BRITISH JOURNALISM EDUCATION AND TRAINING .................................................................. 32 History of Numbers in Newspapers ..................................................................................... 32 Setting the scene ................................................................................................................... 34 The rise of journalism education .......................................................................................... 37 Rise of the training scheme .................................................................................................. 40 Beyond the Academy ........................................................................................................... 47 CHAPTER THREE: CONCEPTUALISING THE FIELD: THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVES ON NUMERACY IN JOURNALISM ....................................................... 51 Evolution of theoretical model ............................................................................................. 51 Bourdieu: Symbolic Capital, Habitus and the Field ............................................................. 53 Epistemological underpinning.............................................................................................. 66 Bourdieu and the critics........................................................................................................ 70 Field theory and online journalism....................................................................................... 76 CHAPTER FOUR: A NUMERACY AUDIT OF TWO UK NEWSPAPERS ....................... 79 Taxonomy of Errors ............................................................................................................. 90 CHAPTER FIVE: NUMERACY, HABITUS AND CULTURAL CAPITAL ..................... 101 Data Presentation................................................................................................................ 103 Factors at Work .................................................................................................................. 106 Changing the Culture ......................................................................................................... 108 Henry Care – Proto-Journalist ............................................................................................ 110 Numeracy Test: Question paper and answers .................................................................... 120 CHAPTER SIX: CASE STUDIES ........................................................................................ 123 3 Case study 1: Forecast of the 2016 US presidential election ............................................. 123 Case study 2: Run-up to the 2015 UK General Election ................................................... 126 Case study 3: Dying for a bacon sandwich ........................................................................ 128 Case study 4: How to cut the perfect roasties .................................................................... 131 Case Study 5: Journalism, Polls And Non-Probability Sampling ...................................... 134 CHAPTER SEVEN: CONCLUSION ................................................................................... 141 Research outcomes ............................................................................................................. 142 Next steps ........................................................................................................................... 143 Some objections ................................................................................................................. 146 Theorising practice/Practising theory: The necessity of self-reflection ............................. 150 Directions for future research ............................................................................................. 152 Coming full circle............................................................................................................... 153 BIBLIOGRAPHY .................................................................................................................. 156 APPENDIX 1: A Journalist’s Guide To Writing With Numbers .......................................... 183 APPENDIX 2: Transcripts of conversations with experts ..................................................... 198 APPENDIX 3: Raw data for newspaper audit ....................................................................... 203 APPENDIX 4: Ethical approval ............................................................................................ 207 Participant information sheet ............................................................................................. 208 Consent form ...................................................................................................................... 210 4 CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION Research motivation The motivation for the present dissertation arose during the three decades the researcher spent working as a journalist from the late 1980s to 2010. Unusually for the profession, the researcher had an active interest in mathematics and completed a BSc in the subject during this period, and so tended to take an interest in news stories which involved numbers and data. It was noticeable that this was not the case with most colleagues. In fact, each year a supplement was produced
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