A new study finds that communities that experience the loss of a local newspaper tend to be somewhat more politically polarized than those that still have a local paper. The authors concluded that newspaper shutdowns are contributing to the bitter divide among ideological camps that have embraced their own sets of “facts,” that may or may not be based on reality. Fractures are more pronounced in people who get most of their news from national sources — often television and online sources — which tend to focus on conflict and competition between the parties, according to the research. Scientific American conducted the study using split-ticket voting rates as an indicator of polarization.
Political Cornflakes: New study suggests the closure of so many local newspapers is helping to break America’s politics
