THE EFFECT OF SOFT NEWS ON PUBLIC ATTACHMENT TO THE NEWS.

Data from a national Australian survey provide little evidence of a significant effect for the taste for soft news on news attachment among the general public as well as the six common sex-by-age targeted market segments of the news industry. This contradicts recent arguments that soft news is necessary to democratic life because, in an age of media proliferation and audience fragmentation, it keeps attention-scarce people with the news. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]