The emergence of the hybrid older reader: A cross-national study

Abstract

Based on a survey of 6,989 individuals aged 60 and up from six countries (Austria, Denmark, Israel, the Netherlands, Romania and Spain), this study aimed at exploring the extent to which digital media practices complement and/or replace print media among older internet users. Results indicated a relative strength of print media among this audience and pointed to four differentiated sub-segments: hybrid readers—who comprised the majority of sample respondents—, heavy print readers, heavy online readers and non-readers. The segment type significantly associated with sociodemographic characteristics. The findings indicate that older readers are not a homogenous group and that their reading habits are affected by a complex configuration of factors: technological features of different media, specific individual psychosocial needs, unequal allocation of cultural capital among varied social groups that results in different levels and types of literacy, and—at least to some extent—idiosyncratic cultural and political conditions in each country.

Local Hybrid Newspapers Typology: Three Cases From Radar Media Group Members In Indonesia

“…Hybrid newspapers that work on a monopolistic market structure and a duopoly market show behaviors that support the complementarity hypothesis, while hybrid newspapers that work on an oligopoly market show behaviors that support the replacement hypothesis. This finding supports previous research where media more commonly use the complementarity hypothesis (Adoni & Nimrod, 2020;Jenkins & Nielsen, 2020;Li & Thorson, 2018;Lie, 2018;Neyazi et al, 2019). The media with the complementarity hypothesis can optimize the business strategy to achieve the expected profit.…”