Dnipro and Kherson became leaders for non-compliance with professional standards: IMI research

In the regional media Kherson and Dnipro complied worse than others with professional journalistic standards. Thus, in Dnipro, the standard of credibility is the least followed : 69% of the total number of analyzed news for compliance with the standard, and in Kherson, the worst respected was the standards of balance of opinions and points of view (44%).

The average level of compliance with the standard of credibility in the regions was 90%, the standard of separation of facts from comments was: 89%, the standard balance of opinions and points of view wasof 86% of the total number of analyzed news.

These are the results of a study by the NGO "Institute of Mass Information", which was conducted in 10 regions of Ukraine in October this year. *

Adherence to journalistic standards in regional news

According to the monitoring results, Cherkasy (98%), Odesa and Kropyvnytskyi were the cities where they complied the most with the standard of credibility (97% of the analyzed news in the region, respectively). The lowest level of compliance with this standard was recorded in the news of the online media Dnipro (69%).

The highest rate of compliance with the standard of separation of facts from comments was demonstrated by news in the online media of the unoccupied territory of Donetsk and Kropyvnytskyi (99% of the analyzed news in the regions, respectively). But Kherson (69%) and Dnipro (71%) online media showed the lowest level of compliance with this standard.

At the same time, the online media of the unoccupied part of Donetsk region had the highest level of compliance with the standard of balance of opinions and points of view : 99% of the total number of analyzed news for compliance with the standard. Kropyvnytskyi's online media also demonstrated 98% compliance with this standard. The worst indicator of compliance with the standard of balance of opinions and points of view was recorded in the regional news of online media in Kherson (44%). However, such results in the region may be related to the campaign related to the intermediary parliamentary elections in the constituency № 184, and as a result many news with signs of political order were published in the media. 

We’ll note that high standards of compliance in other regions may also be associated with a large amount of news, which is based on press releases and reports from various official structures. 

Monitoring also revealed an additional negative trend in the regional news. Although the exaustiveness standard was not the subject of the study, in most regions systematic non-compliance with that stanrad was seen due to the publication of a large number of materials based on official government reports and news based on social media posts and messengers without further processing by online media journalists .  

* As part of the study from October 4, 2021 was analyzed 2500 news (50 news from the news feed of each media from 08:00 on October 4) from 50 regional online media in 10 regions of Ukraine (Volyn, Dnipro, unoccupied territories of Donetsk region (Mariupol ), Lviv, Mykolaiv, Odessa, Poltava, Kharkiv, Kherson, Cherkasy). The monitoring included news from the online media news wire. 

The monitoring methodology included the analysis of news for compliance with three professional standards: the standard of credibility, the standard of separation of facts from comments, the standard of balance of opinions and points of view. Compliance with the standard was assessed at 1 point, non-compliance - 0 point. Each news item was analyzed for compliance with three standards. Each media could score a maximum of 150 points.

Monitoring was conducted in the following media:

VOLYN (Volynski Novyny, VolynPost, Volyn24, Rayon.in.ua, Pid Prytsilom), DNIPRO (Vidkryty, 056, Dneprovska Panorama, Informator, gorod.dp.ua), DONETSK (MARIUPOL) (0629, Novyny Donbasu, Karachun (Slovyansk) , Vostochny variant, MRPL.CITY), KROPYVNYTSKY ( Hrechka , Tochka Dostupu, CBN, Dozor, Bez kupyur, LVIV (Lvivski portal, Zakhid.net, Vgolos, 032.ua, Tvoye misto), ODESSA (Dumska, 048, Оdesskaya zhyzn, USI.Odesa, Odessa online), RIVNE (Radio Track, Rivne Vecherne, Rivnemedia, Rivne 1, OGO), KHARKIV (GorodeKharkov, 057.ua, Vecherny Kharkiv, Status Quo, Objective), KHERSON(KhersonOnline, Miy Kherson, Lyubimiy Kherson, Khersonshchyna za den, Khersontsi), CHERKASY (Vycherpno, 18000, Procherk, Zmi.ck.ua, Provse).