Social Media as news source: How Kazakhstan’s youth consume information

A new model of youth media consumption is emerging in Kazakhstan: social media has become the primary channel for obtaining news, while official news websites remain the most trusted source of information among young people, El.kz reports.

This is stated in the analytical report “The Information Environment Needs of Kazakhstan’s Youth and Their Interaction with News Content,” prepared by the Youth Research Center (YRC) based on a sociological survey conducted among young people aged 14–34.

According to the study, 75.3% of respondents receive information about world events through social media. For comparison, 30.6% cited news websites and apps as a source of information, while 8.2% mentioned television, 6.2% blogs, and 3.5% podcasts.

At the same time, the level of trust in social media is significantly lower than its actual usage. Only 22.5% of young people identified social media as the source they trust the most. Official news websites ranked first in terms of trust, chosen by 53.4% of respondents.

This gap becomes even more evident in fact-checking practices. When young people doubt the accuracy of a news story, 62.5% turn to official news websites for verification. Social media is used for fact-checking by 18.4%, while 7.8% admitted that they do not verify information at all.

The authors of the study note that this trend does not indicate a rejection of news by young people, but rather a change in the way they consume it. Social media serves as a fast and convenient gateway to current events, while official media outlets retain their role as trusted sources for verification.

The study also shows that youth news consumption is becoming increasingly situational. Only 7.4% of respondents follow the news daily, while 40.8% engage with news content only when a specific event captures their attention.

Against this backdrop, expectations regarding content formats are also changing. Short-form videos such as Reels and TikTok were named the most convenient media format by 62.7% of young Kazakhs. In contrast, only 4.5% prefer text-based articles.

News content now has to compete in users’ feeds with entertainment, visual content, and algorithmically promoted posts. However, the demand for reliable information has not disappeared: young audiences want to receive news quickly, but they prefer to verify it through trustworthy sources.