•Social media dependency is lowest among the old folks above 60 years at just nine per cent
•Only 16 per cent of Kenyans between the ages of 15 to 17 rely on social media for news and 23 per cent among those aged between 18 to 29 years.
Image: COURTESY
Young people aged between the ages of 15 to 24 rely more on television for news contrary to the belief that they rely more on social media.
The latest survey by the Media Council of Kenya shows 37 per cent of young people aged between 15 to 17 years and 32 per cent between 18 to 24 years rely on TV for news respectively.
The State of Kenya’s Media 2022 report shows the lowest TV viewership is among Kenyans aged between 30 to 34 with the report showing 30 per cent of them rely on TV for information.
“Overall, legacy media platforms such as television (80 per cent) and newspapers (29 per cent) recorded increased usage in 2022 from 2019, whereas radio has recorded a decline in performance reducing by six per cent points from 84 per cent in 2019 to 78 per cent in 2022,” the report shows.
From the report, radio is mostly listened to by elderly Kenyans who are above 60 years with the data placing the listenership in this age group at 41 per cent and 38 per cent among those aged between 50 to 55 years.
Only 28 per cent of young people aged between 25 and 29 rely on radio for news.
According to the report, only 16 per cent of Kenyans between the ages of 15 to 17 rely on social media for news and 23 per cent among those aged between 18 to 29 years.
Social media dependency is lowest among old folks above 60 years at just nine per cent.
The report further shows that a fraction of Kenyans rely on friends, relatives and colleagues for news while just one per cent rely on bloggers.
“Four in every five 80 per cent of the surveyed respondents highlighted that they rely on television for their information. This marks an improvement from 58 per cent in 2021,” it says.
“The increased subscription rates was anchored by the electioneering period and further amplified by the accessibility of the online platforms powered by YouTube."
The survey commissioned by the MCK and conducted by lnfotrak was conducted between December 8 and December 24 using Computer Assisted Telephone Interviews (CATI) and Computer Assisted Personal Interviews.
The survey targeted 3,331 respondents aged 15 years old and above at the time of the survey in all the 47 counties.