How the Engagement Journalism Movement Is Changing Political News Content: An Applied-Research Study

Abstract

Our multi-methodological, multi-university team was hired to evaluate whether news outlets participating in substantive training in journalism engagement and solutions-oriented practices were also changing their content. Analyzing a large dataset of political stories published by these journalists, we employed both quantitative and qualitative techniques to find significant differences between 2018, 2020, and 2022 political coverage: fewer horse-race (game) framed stories, more content considered to be “engaged,” more transparent stories, and somewhat of a boost in solutions-oriented content. This work documents and measures these content changes, adding to a burgeoning body of scholarship about engagement and solutions journalism.