Every second Ukrainian believes that the broadcast of a single official point of view is not acceptable even in wartime.

A new research by the NGO "Detector Media" of the media literacy index of Ukrainians shows that over the past two years, respondents have become more likely to believe that the media work in the interests of society and the state, but despite the war, they need different points of view on events and are looking for other sources of information due to their absence in the United News telethon.

61% of the audience consider the format of the telethon to be completely justified during the war, but at the same time, almost every second Ukrainian (45%) is inclined to think that the broadcast of a single official point of view is not acceptable even at such a time. 70% state that due to the lack of different points of view on events in the telethon, they look for information in other sources.

The share of Ukrainians who believe that the media work in the interests of the state and society as a whole increased from 8% to 31% and from 8% to 15%, respectively. The first indicator is obviously related to the transition to the single news telethon format, the second - both with the marathon and with the dominance on television and in most Internet sources on social networks of content aimed at uniting society, increasing trust in public institutions and authorities.

At the same time, Ukrainians' awareness of the existence of public mass media, as well as awareness of their role, has increased. The absolute majority (78%) emphasize the importance of the existence of public mass media, because they work in the interests of the whole society, not the owner (56%); cover topics that are not of interest to commercial mass media, such as social problems, culture, science (10%); in addition, public media are not interested in manipulation (12%).

The share of the audience that is sure that public mass media work in Ukraine has almost doubled in 2 years: from 34% to 60%. At the same time, every fifth 20% hold the opinion that there are no independent broadcasters in the country. The same proportion could not answer the question unambiguously.

The share of those not interested in the development of public broadcasting decreased in 2 years from 24% to 17%. In their opinion, 13% of respondents believe that the media cannot be independent, another 4% believe that public media lose to commercial media in terms of quality and professionalism. The share of Ukrainians who express interest in the existence of editorially independent media has increased by 10% in 2 years.

About the research: the nationwide quantitative survey was conducted by the New Image Marketing Group company on the order of Detector Media in December 2022 - January 2023. The data were collected using a face-to-face interview using a tablet based on a standardized questionnaire (CAPI), which was conducted among residents of Ukraine over the age of 18 in person. Sample: 1,200 respondents, representative by age, gender, region and type of settlement (with the exception of the temporarily occupied territories of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, Kherson regions and Crimean Autonomous Republic).

The study was carried out with the financial support of the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs (DANIDA).