Survey: Journalists better respected than they think

University of Haifa study finds general public largely sees journalism as an honorable profession.

By JUDY SIEGEL-ITZKOVICH
newspaper 88 (photo credit: )
newspaper 88
(photo credit: )
Although journalists have for some time regarded themselves as an unloved bunch - appreciated little more than Knesset members - a new University of Haifa survey has found that the public respects journalists more than they themselves do. The results of the survey were presented at a conference of journalists currently being held in Eilat. The study team surveyed 331 journalists in the print, broadcast and Internet media, including those working for the foreign, sectoral (religious or ethnic) and local press. The journalists' views were compared with those of the general public. On a scale of one to seven, the respondents from the general public gave journalism relatively high marks, with three quarters ranking it five to seven when asked whether it was an honorable profession. Seventy-one percent of the journalists ranked it five to seven. The average score given the profession by journalists was five. Most of them ranked the social, economic, military and security professions, and even politics, as being more honorable than journalism. The journalists gave the highest scores to their colleagues in nationwide radio (5.5 average score), followed by those working in television (5.46), newspapers (5.45), the Internet (4.4%), sectoral journalism (4.04) and local newspapers (3.81). When asked to compare their salaries to the average wage among all workers, 22% said they earn "much more" and 32% said "a bit more," but 31% said they earn "less or much less" than the average. The survey was conducted by Dr. Yariv Tsfati, Dr. Yonatan Cohen, Dr. Oren Mayers and Dr. Ro'i Davidson of the university's communications department.