Subjectivity, engagement, and trust: understanding how subjectivity in online news affects readers

Subjective language in news reporting has become increasingly common, partly due to the engagement-driven logic of social media. This study investigates how language subjectivity, the medium of news delivery, and selected individual characteristics influence readers' perceptions and judgments of online news. Across three experiments using unfamiliar news sources, we examined readers’ ability to distinguish between subjective and objective content, and how subjectivity impacts engagement and perceived source trustworthiness. Results show that readers can generally distinguish between subjective and objective news. This ability improves with greater print exposure, highlighting the role of general literacy skills. Contrary to expectations, subjective messages did not increase engagement, measured by intent to read the full article. However, they did reduce the perceived trustworthiness of unfamiliar sources. Additionally, familiarity with social media news was associated with higher trust and engagement. Overall, while subjective language does not necessarily increase engagement, it can undermine trust in the news source.