Richard Fletcher
Richard Fletcher is an academic researcher. He is primarily interested in global trends in digital news consumption, comparative media research, the use of social media by journalists and news organizations, and more broadly, the relationship between technology and journalism.
Richard primarily works on the Digital News Project (www.digitalnewsreport.org) and is lead researcher and co-author of the main Digital News Report – the world's largest annual survey of global news consumption. Richard also uses this survey data to underpin comparative cross-national research into patterns of news conumption, audience fragmentation and polarisation, the effects of search engines and social media on news use, trust in the news, and paying for digital news.
In 2018, Richard won the International Communication Association Journalism Studies division's Wolfgang Donbach Outstanding Journal Article of the Year Award (with Rasmus Kleis Nielsen) for 'Are News Audiences Increasingly Fragmented?'. He was also nominated twice for the Bob Franklin Journal Article Award for 'Paying for Online News' (with Rasmus Kleis Nielsen) and 'The Impact of Trust in the News Media on Online News Consumption and Participation' (with Sora Park).
Before arriving at Oxford, Richard was previously a Junior Research Fellow in the Department of Journalism at City University London. Here he worked on the development and evaluation of SocialSensor (www.socialsensor.eu) – a tool designed to allow journalists to collect, process, and aggregate large streams of social media data in order to discover trends, events, influencers, and interesting media content.
Richard’s original undergraduate and employment background was in computer science. Since then he has completed an MSc in Science, Medicine, Technology and Society from Imperial College London and a PhD in Sociology from the University of Surrey.
Publications
2019
- Fletcher, Richard. 2019. "Did the Conservatives Embrace Social Media in 2019?" in UK Election Analysis 2019: Media, Voters, and the Campaign, edited by Einar Thorson, Daniel Jackson, Darren Lilleker and Nathalie Weidhase, 80-81. Poole: Bournemouth University.
- Fletcher, Richard, Alessio Cornia, and Rasmus Kleis Nielsen. 2019. "How Polarized Are Online and Offline News Audiences? A Comparative Analysis of Twelve Countries." The International Journal of Press/Politics, Online First.
- Thurman, Neil, and Richard Fletcher. 2019. "Effects of a Magazine’s Move to Online-only: Post-print Audience Attention and Readership Retention Revisited." Journalism Practice, Online First.
- Fletcher, Richard, and Meera Selva. 2019. How Brexit Referendum Voters Use News. Oxford: Reuters Institute for the Study for the Study of Journalism.
- Fletcher, Richard, and Rasmus Kleis Nielsen. 2019. "Generalised Scepticism: How People Navigate News on Social Media." Information, Communication & Society 22 (12): 1751-1769.
- Thurman, Neil, and Richard Fletcher. 2019. "Has Digital Distribution Rejuvenated Readership? Revisiting the Age Demographics of Newspaper Consumption." Journalism Studies 20 (4): 542-562.
- Newman, Nic, Richard Fletcher, Antonis Kalogeropoulos, and Rasmus Kleis Nielsen. 2019. Reuters Institute Digital News Report 2019. Oxford: Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism.
- Fletcher, Richard, and Joy Jenkins. 2019. Polarisation and the News Media in Europe. Brussels: European Parliament.
- Kalogeropoulos, Antonis, Richard Fletcher, and Rasmus Kleis Nielsen. 2019. "News Brand Attribution in Distributed Environments: Do People Know Where They Get Their News?" New Media & Society 21 (3): 583-601.
- Lee, Francis F. L., Michael Che-ming Chan, Hsuan-Ting Chen, Rasmus Kleis Nielsen, and Richard Fletcher. 2019. "Consumptive News Feed Curation on Social Media as Proactive Personalization: A Study of Six East Asian Markets." Journalism Studies 20 (15): 2277-2292.
2018
- Thurman, Neil, and Richard Fletcher. 2018. "Are Newspapers Heading Towards Post-Print Obscurity? A Case Study of The Independent's Transition to Online-Only." Digital Journalism 6 (8): 1003-1107.
- Thurman, Niel, and Richard Fletcher. 2018. "Save Money, Lose Impact." British Journalism Review 29 (3): 31-36.
- Fletcher, Richard, and Rasmus Kleis Nielsen. 2018. "Automated Serendipity: The Effect of Using Search Engines on News Reportoire Diversity and Balance." Digital Journalism 6 (8): 976-989.
- Fletcher, Richard, and Rasmus Kleis Nielsen. 2018. "Are People Incidentally Exposed to News on Social Media?: A Comparative Analysis." New Media & Society 20 (7): 2450-2468.
- Newman, Nic, Richard Fletcher, Antonis Kalogeropoulos, David A. L. Levy, and Rasmus Kleis Nielsen. 2018. Reuters Institute Digital News Report 2018. Oxford: Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism.
- Newman, Nic, and Richard Fletcher. 2018. "Platform Reliance, Information Intermediaries, and News Diversity: A Look at the Evidence." in Digital Dominance: The Power of Google, Amazon, Facebook, and Apple, edited by Martin Moore and Damian Tambini, 133-152. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
- Fletcher, Richard, and Rasmus Kleis Nielsen. 2018. "People Don't Trust News Media - And This is Key to the Global Misinformation Debate." in Understanding and Addressing the Disinformation Ecosystem. First Draft.
2017
- Newman, Nic, and Richard Fletcher. 2017. Bias, Bullshit and Lies: Audience Perspectives on Low Trust in the Media. Oxford: Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism.
- Fletcher, Richard, and Rasmus Kleis Nielsen. 2017. "Are News Audiences Increasingly Fragmented? A Cross-National Comparative Analysis of Cross-Platform News Audience Fragmentation and Duplication." Journal of Communication 67 (4): 476-498.
- Newman, Nic, Richard Fletcher, Antonis Kalogeropoulos, David A. L. Levy, and Rasmus Kleis Nielsen. 2017. Reuters Institute Digital News Report 2017. Oxford: Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism.
- Fletcher, Richard. 2017. "Labour's Social Media Campaign: More Posts, More Video, and More Interaction." in UK Election Analysis 2017: Media, Voters, and the Campaign, edited by Einar Thorson, Daniel Jackson, and Darren Lilleker, 92-93. Poole: Bournemouth University.
- Fletcher, Richard, Steve Schifferes, and Neil Thurman. 2017 "Building the 'Truthmeter': Training Algorithms to Help Journalists Assess the Credibility of Social Media Sources." Convergence, Online First.
- Fletcher, Richard, and Sora Park. 2017. "The Impact of Trust in the News Media on Online News Consumption and Participation." Digital Journalism 5 (10): 1281-1299.
- Fletcher, Richard and Rasmus Kleis Nielsen. 2017. "Paying for Online News: A Comparative Analysis of Six Countries." Digital Journalism 5 (9): 1173-1191.
2016
- Painter, James, María Carmen Erviti, Richard Fletcher, Candice Howarth, Silje Kristiansen, Bienvenido León, Alan Ouakrat, Adrienne Russell, Mike S. Schäfer. 2016. Something Old, Something New: Digital Media and the Coverage of Climate Change. Oxford: Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism.
- Nielsen, Rasmus Kleis, Richard Fletcher, Annika Sehl, and David A. L. Levy. 2016. Analysis of the Relation Between and Impact of Public Service Media and Private Media. Oxford: Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism.
- Newman, Nic, Richard Fletcher, David A. L. Levy, and Rasmus Kleis Nielsen. 2016. Reuters Institute Digital News Report 2016. Oxford: Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism.
- Thurman, Neil, Steve Schifferes, Richard Fletcher, Nic Newman, Stephen Hunt, and Aljosha Karim Schapals. 2016. "Giving Computers a Nose for News: Exploring the Limits of Story Detection and Verification." Digital Journalism 4 (7): 838-848.
2015
- Fletcher, Richard, Damian Radcliffe, David A. L. Levy, Rasmus Kleis Nielsen, and Nic Newman. 2015. Reuters Institute Digital News Report 2015: Supplementary Report. Oxford: Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism.
Media
- Fletcher, Richard. "People Most Likely to Vote Conservative are the Least Likely to Get News Online." Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, December 13, 2019.
- Selva, Meera, Rasmus Kleis Nielsen, and Richard Fletcher. "The Real Loser in Britain’s Divisive Elections? The Media." Washington Post, November 26, 2019.
- Nielsen, Rasmus Kleis, Meera Selva, and Richard Fletcher. "An Election Fought in Screens Big and Small: How British Voters Get their News." Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, November 18, 2019.
- Selva, Meera, and Richard Fletcher. "Brexit: Democracy Needs Journalists to be Transparent about their Political Sources." The Conversation, October 25, 2019.
- Kalogeropoulos, Antonis, and Richard Fletcher. "In the U.S., the Left Trusts the Mainstream Media More than the Right, and the Gap is Growing." Nieman Lab, June 13, 2018.
- Fletcher, Richard. "Online News is Highly Polarised in Some Countries – But Technology is Not to Blame." The Conversation, June 22, 2017.
- Fletcher, Richard, and Rasmus Kleis Nielsen. "Using Social Media Appears to Diversify Your News Diet, Not Narrow It." Nieman Lab, June 21, 2017.