Do alternative media users distrust all mainstream news or only some? Assessing Danish left-wing and right-wing alternative media users’ trust in news at the outlet-specific level

Until the turn of the century, the democratic task of informing citizens about societal matters (Strömbäck, 2005) largely befell professional (mass) news media, since they enjoyed a key position as gatekeepers of information on politics and society (Tandoc, 2018). In recent years, however, they have faced competition from online alternative news sites (Pedersen et al., 2024), which have gained prominence across many Western media systems (Strömbäck, 2023). This is also the case in the Nordic countries, where they attract sizeable audiences (Brems, 2024a; Schulze, 2020). These alternative news media (hereafter “alternative media”) present themselves as a necessary counterbalance to alleged biases in mainstream news media (hereafter “mainstream media”) and explicitly call into question their trustworthiness (Holt et al., 2019; Ihlebæk et al., 2022).

Accordingly, research into alternative media has been particularly interested in studying the link between using alternative media and (lacking) trust in mainstream media. That citizens trust (mainstream) news media is often described as vital to democracy (e.g., Strömbäck et al., 2020), among other things because it is a prerequisite for establishing a shared sense of reality (Coleman, 2012) and because news media can only fulfil their role as watchdogs if citizens trust their reporting on powerholders’ (mis)conduct (van Dalen, 2020). How alternative media use is associated with trust in mainstream media can thus be considered an important indicator of the societal implications of the proliferation of alternative media. Recent studies have established that users of alternative media have lower trust in mainstream media than the rest of the population (e.g., Frischlich et al., 2023; Mourão et al., 2018; Schulze, 2020), and a Swedish study suggests that this relationship is mutually reinforcing: Low-trusting citizens orient themselves more towards alternative news, which in turn decreases trust in mainstream news (Andersen et al., 2021a). Based on prior research, alternative media can thus be viewed as a challenge to democracy, as use of them reflects disenchantment with mainstream media among parts of the population and may further fuel such sentiments.

This article extends existing knowledge about the relationship between alternative media use and trust in mainstream media in two central ways: First, alternative media exist on both sides of the political spectrum (e.g., Benkler et al., 2018; McDowell-Naylor et al., 2021), but most prior studies treat alternative media as one group (e.g., Andersen et al., 2021a; Frischlich et al., 2023) or only focus on right-wing alternative media (e.g., Schulze, 2020; but see Tsfati et al., 2024). However, right-wing alternative media are more hostile towards mainstream media than their left-wing counterparts (Brems, 2023; Tsfati et al., 2024). Therefore, a relevant question is whether use of both is associated with lower trust or if lower trust only pertains to or is more pronounced among users of right-wing alternative media. Investigating this can help clarify whether left-wing and right-wing alternative media pose equal problems for democracy (given that use of them may reflect or fuel dissatisfaction with mainstream media).

Second, most existing studies focus on (right-wing) alternative media users’ trust in mainstream media in general (as a notable exception, see Schulze, 2020). Yet, qualitative interviews with alternative media users showed that some users exempt specific mainstream news outlets from their general criticism of mainstream media (Brems, 2025). Furthermore, people generally tend to have higher trust in news media they use or align with ideologically (e.g., Newman et al., 2018), demonstrating that people do not have the same levels of trust in all mainstream outlets. This raises the important question of whether alternative media users’ lower trust pertains to all major mainstream news outlets or is confined to specific mainstream news outlets. Investigating this is important for understanding whether alternative media users disregard information from all mainstream sources of news or if there are some mainstream outlets whose information they trust.

To address these two gaps, the present study distinguishes between users of left-wing and right-wing alternative media (and cross-cutting users of both) and assesses their trust in mainstream media at the outlet-specific level (Strömbäck et al., 2020). To my knowledge, this is the first study to do so. The study draws on original survey data from a nationally representative sample of the adult Danish population (N = 1,518) and focuses on trust in seven Danish mainstream news outlets of different types (public service broadcasters, quality newspapers, tabloids) and with different ideological leanings (left-wing and right-wing).

The study contributes two novel empirical insights: First, the users of left-wing alternative media only have lower trust in (purportedly) right-leaning mainstream outlets, whereas the users of right-wing alternative media have lower trust in mainstream outlets regardless of their ideological leanings, indicating more generalised lower trust. Second, although the alternative media users have lower trust in mainstream media than the rest of the population, their trust is still fairly high in substantive terms, especially in public service news. I conclude the article by discussing potential explanations to these findings and their democratic implications vis-à-vis the characteristics of the Danish case and how the insights from the study may transfer to other media contexts.

As noted, it is already well-established that alternative media use is associated with lower trust in mainstream media. This can have several theoretical explanations. Following uses and gratifications theory, citizens rationally use news media to fulfil certain needs (e.g., Ruggiero, 2000); thus, citizens who find mainstream news coverage biased might turn to alternatives providing other facts and perspectives (Andersen et al., 2021a; Tsfati & Cappella, 2003). Selective exposure theory posits that citizens seek out news content confirming their prior attitudes (Stroud, 2011); thus, alternative media may appeal to citizens who already have lower trust in mainstream news because their explicit criticism of mainstream media (Figenschou & Ihlebæk, 2019) confirms that such attitudes are justified.

Taking a media effects perspective (Hetzel et al., 2022), continuous exposure to alternative media’s explicit criticism of mainstream media might cause their users to lose trust in mainstream media. It is also possible that selection and media effects are at play at the same time in a mutually reinforcing spiral (Slater et al., 2020), as indicated by the above-mentioned Swedish study (Andersen et al., 2021a). Finally, the relationship could be expected based on the theory of hostile media effects (Vallone et al., 1985). Users of alternative media take more left-wing and right-wing ideological stances (Brems, 2024a) and hold more positive and negative attitudes towards immigration, respectively (Schulze, 2020; Theorin & Strömbäck, 2020). When they have stronger political attitudes, they may be more prone to perceive mainstream news coverage as biased against their own views.

One of news media’s most important tasks is providing citizens the information they need to make sound political decisions and be self-governing (Schudson, 2008). By leaving information gathering to news media, citizens save time (Rosanvallon, 2008), but at the cost of uncertainty: Citizens cannot keep an eye on choices made in the news selection and production processes (Fawzi et al., 2021; Schudson, 1998: 195; Tsfati & Cappella, 2003; van Dalen, 2020). Therefore, when citizens trust the news, they run the risk of forming opinions and making political decisions based on inaccurate or insufficient information (van Dalen, 2020). Accordingly, trust can be defined as a relationship between a trustor (news user) and trustee (news media) (Strömbäck et al., 2020; Tsfati & Cappella, 2003; van Dalen, 2020), where the trustor is willing to be vulnerable to the trustee based on past experiences and positive future expectations (Fawzi et al., 2021; Hanitzsch et al., 2018).

Trust in news media can be measured at different levels of analysis ranging from news media in general at the highest level of abstraction to media types (e.g., newspapers, television), specific news media brands, journalists, and news content (e.g., coverage of specific topics) at lower levels of abstraction (Strömbäck et al., 2020; see also Fawzi et al., 2021). Due to limited research, it is not clear how trust in news media at the different levels of trust are related to each other (Strömbäck et al., 2020). However, prior studies indicate that it makes a difference what level trust is measured on. For instance, people tend to report higher trust in news outlets than in journalists (Andersen et al., 2021b) and trust specific news media they use more than news media in general (Newman et al., 2018).

Much research focuses on general news media trust (Strömbäck et al., 2020). This form of measurement has the limitation that it is ambiguous as to what “news media in general” refers to (Engelke et al., 2019; Mourão et al., 2018), and it does not take into account that people report diverging levels of trust in different news outlets, for instance, based on ideological leaning, as discussed above (Newman et al., 2018). Compared with this, measuring trust in specific news outlets has the advantage that it is clear what object of trust respondents are asked to evaluate, and it allows respondents to express diverging levels of trust in different mainstream media. Thus, this approach may give a more precise and nuanced picture of alternative media users’ trust in mainstream media.

Like other Nordic countries, Denmark is characterised by a strong public service media tradition (Hallin & Mancini, 2004). The two major public service broadcasters, DR and TV 2, are required to be neutral, and previous studies have shown that both are politically balanced (e.g., Albæk et al., 2015). Nonetheless, DR has often been accused of leaning to the left, and TV 2 to the right (Albæk et al., 2010). Newspapers severed their party-political ties and professionalised during the twentieth century (Hallin & Mancini, 2004), but traces of the party-press can still be found: Danish news users identify the quality newspaper Politiken and the tabloid Ekstra Bladet as left-leaning, and the quality newspapers Berlingske and Jyllands-Posten and the tabloid B.T. as right-leaning (Hjarvard, 2007). Content analysis of news articles from three of the newspapers found no left-wing or right-wing bias with respect to source balance and tone (Albæk et al., 2015), but other studies found that the quality newspapers’ ideological leanings are reflected in their opinion sections, to some extent also in their news selection and angles (e.g., Hjarvard, 2010). This context, where the major news outlets (purportedly) have ideological leanings, makes the Danish case well-suited for investigating whether alternative media users’ trust in mainstream media depends on the outlets’ ideological leanings.

Unlike many other countries, Denmark has not witnessed a decline in news media trust over the past decade (Andersen et al., 2021b), and trust is generally high, especially in public service broadcasters, which are trusted by approximately four in five Danes (Schrøder et al., 2022). However, the parts of the population identifying as left-wing and right-wing are more critical of mainstream media (Schrøder et al., 2021), creating grounds for expecting users of left-wing and right-wing alternative media to have lower trust in mainstream media than the rest of the population.

Mainstream media make room for right-wing populist positions and immigration-critical views (Bächler & Hopmann, 2017; Mayerhöffer, 2021), and public debate has a long-standing tradition of being inclusive of what may be seen as controversial (right-wing) points of view. This sets Denmark apart from neighbouring countries Germany and Sweden, where mainstream media have made limited room for far-right and populist right-wing actors and views (e.g., Heft et al., 2020), although this has changed in recent years. Furthermore, studies suggest that immigration coverage is more negative in Denmark. A comparative content analysis of Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish newspaper coverage of immigration found that “Swedish discourse has been more amicable towards immigrants, while the Danish has been harsher and more critical”, for instance, reflected in stronger emphasis on threat frames in Denmark (Hovden & Mjelde, 2019: 139). Another comparative study of media coverage of the refugee crisis in 2014–2015 in Sweden, Germany, the UK, Spain, and Italy similarly found that the Swedish press had the most positive coverage of refugees. The same study showed that both Swedish and German coverage predominantly used terms like “refugee” and “asylum seeker” (rather than “immigrant” or “illegal”) and discussed refugees as a threat to national security to a lesser extent than the other countries (Berry et al., 2015).

In the concluding discussion, I reflect on what these characteristics of the Danish case mean for the interpretation of the findings presented and their relevance in other media contexts.

This study is based on an online survey administered to a quota sample representative of the adult Danish population (18+) with respect to gender, age, region, and education, collected by YouGov from their panel in Denmark between 17 January and 7 February 2023 – a non-election period. Online panels have the limitation that they can, naturally, only capture responses from the parts of the population with Internet access. However, Internet penetration is high in Denmark (97%), also among the oldest age group (91% for 75–84-year-olds; Agency for Digital Government, n.d.). 3,116 panellists were invited, and 2,735 completed the questionnaire (87.8%). 280 respondents were excluded due to speeding (completing the survey in less than half the median time spent by the rest of the respondents; for a comparable approach, see Frischlich et al., 2023). The survey included an experiment, and the present study only includes respondents who were not exposed to experimental treatment. ⁽¹⁾ This resulted in a sample of N = 1,518. Ethical approval was obtained from the institutional review board before data collection.

The variables for trust in the specific mainstream outlets were regressed on the variable for alternative media use and the controls outlined above in six separate OLS regression models: one for DR, one for TV 2, one for Ekstra Bladet, one for B.T., one for Politiken, and one for Berlingske and Jyllands-Posten combined. This makes it possible to compare the different (non-)user groups’ levels of trust in news coverage from the mainstream outlets controlled for background variables. A quadratic term for ideological orientation was included in all OLS regression models, since both more left-wing and more right-wing ideological orientation could be positively or negatively associated with trust in mainstream media. In some of the regression models, the assumption of homoscedasticity was not met, why all models were run with robust standard errors. Findings from the regression analyses will be presented in figures displaying the predicted average levels of trust for the different user-groups compared with non-users (i.e., the part of the population that does not use alternative media), controlled for background variables. The advantage of this approach is that the figures thus display the differences in levels of trust between the (non-)user groups (corresponding to the regression coefficients) while at the same time making it possible to assess the users’ levels of trust in substantive terms. Tables with full results from the regression models are available in Appendix B (Tables B1–B6).

In the survey, respondents were also inquired about their trust in the specific mainstream outlets’ news coverage of three specific topics: climate, immigration/integration, and economy. As a robustness check, the analyses were also run using respondents’ trust in coverage of the specific topics as a dependent variable instead of coverage of news in general. This made no substantial differences to the findings. These results are also available in Appendix B (Tables B1–B6).

In total, 588 respondents reported using alternative media, corresponding to 24 per cent of the full sample (or an estimated 23.4% of the adult Danish population when weighting data to match the population in terms of gender, age, education, and residence). The findings suggest that using only right-wing alternative media is much more widespread (n = 403, corresponding to an estimated 15.8% of the population) than using only left-wing alternative media (n = 81, corresponding to an estimated 3.2% of the population) or using both (n = 104, corresponding to an estimated 4.4% of the population). ⁽²⁾

The results from the six OLS regression models are displayed in Figure 1. Specifically, the figure displays the different alternative media user-groups’ predicted average levels of trust in coverage of news in general from the mainstream news outlets inquired about compared with the rest of the population (referred to as “non-users” throughout the rest of the analysis), controlled for background variables. The (purportedly) left-leaning outlets are placed in the left column, and the (purportedly) right-leaning outlets in the right column. The two public service broadcasters are placed in the top row, the quality newspapers in the middle row, and the tabloids in the bottom row.

Figure 1

Predicted average levels of trust in news from specific mainstream outlets by alternative news use

Comments: DR: N = 1,305, R² = .16. TV2: N = 646, R² = .15. Politiken: N = 476, R² = .26. Berlingske/Jyllands-Posten: N = 923, R² = .16. Ekstra Bladet: N = 588, R² = .19. B.T.: N = 554, R² = .23. Controlled for age, gender, residence, education, ideological orientation, political interest, and mainstream news use (public service, quality newspapers, tabloids). Dashed lines mark the predicted average level of trust for non-users. CI error bars at 95%. Public service broadcasters are displayed in top row, quality newspapers in middle row, tabloids in bottom row; (purportedly) left-leaning outlets in left column, and (purportedly) right-leaning outlets in right column.

RQ1 asked whether users of both left-wing and right-wing alternative media have lower trust in mainstream media. In response to this, the findings displayed in Figure 1 show that, compared with non-users, the users who only use left-wing alternative media have significantly lower predicted average levels of trust in news from the (purportedly) right-leaning mainstream news outlets TV 2, Berlingske/Jyllands-Posten, and B.T., but not so in news from the (purportedly) left-leaning mainstream outlets DR, Politiken, and Ekstra Bladet. The users who only use right-wing alternative media have significantly lower predicted average levels of trust than non-users in news from all the investigated mainstream outlets except the left-leaning tabloid Ekstra Bladet. Similarly, when compared to non-users, cross-cutting users of both left-wing and right-wing alternative media also have lower predicted average levels of trust in news from all outlets except Ekstra Bladet, although the difference is not significant for TV 2 and B.T. Setting this user-group apart, they have significantly higher predicted average levels of trust in news from the tabloid Ekstra Bladet than non-users. In other words, all groups of alternative media users have lower trust in some, but not in all, mainstream outlets.

The findings presented so far also provide an answer to RQ2, which asked whether users of left-wing and right-wing alternative media have lower trust in news from all major mainstream outlets regardless of their ideological leanings or whether this depends on the outlets’ ideological leanings. As already indicated, the findings displayed in Figure 1 show that the users who only use left-wing alternative media follow a clear ideologically-partisan pattern: They have lower trust than non-users in news from mainstream outlets that have – or are accused of having – a right-wing ideological leaning, but when it comes to news from mainstream outlets with a (purported) left-leaning perspective, their levels of trust are not significantly different from non-users. Unlike this, the general tendency of the findings displayed in Figure 1 is that users who use right-wing alternative media (either solely or in combination with left-wing alternative media) do not follow an ideologically partisan pattern but tend to have lower trust in news from mainstream outlets regardless of their ideological leanings (with Ekstra Bladet as an exception). This indicates that users of right-wing alternative media have more generalised lower trust in mainstream news. ⁽³⁾

As noted above, a prior study found that three of the right-wing alternative media included in this study voice more severe criticism of mainstream media (Brems, 2023). This raises the question of whether it is the use of these specific right-wing alternative media that drives the pattern of more generalised lower trust among users of right-wing alternative media. To test this, the six OLS regressions were run again with another variable for alternative media use, where respondents who reported use of at least one of the three right-wing alternative media voicing more severe criticism were coded as a separate group. ⁽⁴⁾ This makes the user-groups small but can give an indication of any differences between users who only seek out more moderate right-wing alternative media and users of the right-wing alternative media that voice more severe mainstream media criticism. These results are available in Appendix B (see Table B7). For the users who only use right-wing alternative media, the patterns largely remain the same. The only noteworthy difference is that the users who exclusively use the right-wing alternative media that do not voice severe media criticism only have marginally and not significantly lower trust in news from purportedly right-leaning TV 2 than non-users (β = −0.01). This could indicate that these users’ lower trust is not as all-encompassing. However, they still have significantly lower trust in DR, Politiken, Berlingske/Jyllands-Posten, and B.T. A more notable difference emerges for the cross-cutting users: The cross-cutting users who do not use right-wing alternative media that voice severe media criticism do not have significantly lower or higher trust than non-users in DR (β = −0.02), TV 2 (β = 0.01), and Politiken (β = 0.02). This indicates that among the cross-cutting users, it is the use of right-wing alternative media that voice severe mainstream media criticism that drives the lower levels of trust. However, these findings must be read with the reservation that the cross-cutting user groups become very small when split (n = 38; n = 66).

Finally, two additional insights should be highlighted. First, the findings displayed in Figure 1 show that although the users of alternative media have relatively lower trust than non-users (in some outlets), they still have fairly high levels of trust in substantive terms: When looking at trust in the public service broadcasters and quality newspapers, none fall below the midpoint of the scale. Second, Figure 1 also shows a general tendency of both non-users and users of alternative media to have the highest predicted average levels of trust in news from public service broadcasters, comparatively lower (but still high) levels of trust in news from quality newspapers, and the lowest levels of trust in news from tabloids. This adds considerable nuance to our understanding of what news alternative media users rely on.

A key question within alternative media research is how exposure to these competitors to mainstream media is related to trust in mainstream news. Recent studies have established that using alternative media is related to lower trust in mainstream media (Andersen et al., 2021a; Mourão et al., 2018; Schulze, 2020), but most of them have assessed the users’ trust in mainstream media in general and either treated alternative media users as a collective group or focused exclusively on users of right-wing alternative media. To my knowledge, this study is the first to investigate alternative media users’ trust in mainstream media at the outlet-specific level while distinguishing between users of left-wing and right-wing alternative media.

The findings presented add important nuances to our understanding of the association between alternative media use and trust in mainstream media in two central ways. On the one hand, the results show that users of both right-wing and left-wing alternative media (and cross-cutting users of both) have lower trust in mainstream media than the rest of the population. Thus, while current alternative media research has been particularly concerned with right-wing alternative media’s critical and sometimes antagonistic position vis-à-vis mainstream media (e.g., Figenschou & Ihlebæk, 2019; Holt, 2020; Mayerhöffer, 2021) and disenchantment with mainstream media among their users (e.g., Ihlebæk & Holter, 2021; Schulze, 2020; Thorbjørnsrud & Figenschou, 2022), lower trust in mainstream media can also be observed among their left-wing counterparts. On the other hand, the results also reveal a notable difference between users of left-wing and right-wing alternative media: Compared with the rest of the population, users who exclusively seek out left-wing alternative media only have lower trust in (purportedly) right-leaning mainstream outlets, whereas users of right-wing alternative media have lower trust in mainstream outlets regardless of their ideological leanings. This has the important implication that left-wing alternative media users’ lower trust in mainstream media is seemingly not as all-encompassing and that these users have mainstream outlets to turn to which they trust to the same extent as the rest of the population. In contrast, users of right-wing alternative media seemingly have more generalised lower trust.

However, it should be noted that none of the user groups have lower trust in all mainstream outlets assessed. This is in line with qualitative studies showing that users of alternative media sometimes have specific mainstream media they are less critical of (Brems, 2025) and that some users aim their media criticism at coverage of specific news topics (Noppari et al., 2019; Thorbjørnsrud & Figenschou, 2022).

Of course, the study is not without limitations. As already discussed, the study is based on cross-sectional data and thus cannot speak to causality. In addition to this, the study only focused on trust in different national news outlets. Including regional or local news might render other valuable insights. Analyses using trust in mainstream coverage of specific news topics were run as a robustness check and did not show substantially different findings. However, all three topics included were contested issues (climate, immigration/integration, economy). Interview studies suggest that some alternative media users’ criticism of biased mainstream media coverage particularly regard such contested topics (Noppari et al., 2019) and indicate that the users are less critical of coverage of topics like local news and traffic (Thorbjørnsrud & Figenschou, 2022). Investigating alternative media users’ trust in mainstream news coverage of a broader scope of topics could deepen understanding of how all-encompassing the users’ lower trust is by uncovering whether their lower trust only pertains to specific, contested topics and not to less-contested topics.

Finally, the measurement of alternative media use relied on self-reports, which may result in over-reporting (Prior, 2009) or under-reporting (Müller & Schulz, 2021). As such, it is possible that some respondents have reported using alternative media without being users, or that the measurement has not captured all users. Moreover, desirability bias could induce respondents to report higher trust than they really have. These issues could potentially make alternative news users’ levels of trust appear higher and make the differences between users and non-users appear smaller than they really are.

Despite these shortcomings, the study has provided valuable new empirical knowledge by uncovering notable differences between left-wing and right-wing alternative media users’ trust in mainstream media. Furthermore, the study has demonstrated the relevance of distinguishing between different groups of users of alternative media as well as between trust in specific mainstream news outlets. These are important insights on which future studies can build. Finally, the study has added the important nuance that alternative media users’ levels of trust are seemingly not alarmingly low in the case of Denmark and, more broadly, that the specific characteristics of the media systems that alternative media are a part of must be considered when assessing the democratic implications of their proliferation.