MANILA — One in 5 Filipino adults use Facebook daily as a source of news, higher compared to the combined number of those who rely on radio and newspapers, according to a Social Weather Stations (SWS) survey released Saturday.
The March 28 to 31 poll found that 21 percent of adult Filipinos or an estimated 13.9 million individuals use Facebook daily for reading the news.
A majority 60 percent or 40.4 million adults still consume news daily through television, while only 15 percent do so through radio and only 2 percent read newspapers daily, said SWS.
"Thus, Facebook as a daily news source is more common than radio and newspapers combined, and is second only to television," the pollster noted.
FACEBOOK MEMBERSHIP
As of March 2019, 99 percent of adults who use the internet or around 30.3 million individuals have a Facebook account, said SWS.
YouTube is the second most popular social media site among adult Filipinos, with 11.7 million individuals or 38 percent of adult internet users saying they have an account at the video-sharing platform.
The survey also found that having a Facebook account is more common among urban dwellers (56 percent) than rural dwellers (38 percent).
By major geographic areas, the proportion of adults with Facebook account is highest in Metro Manila at 64 percent, followed by other Luzon areas at 48 percent, Mindanao at 39 percent, and the Visayas at 33 percent.
Reading the news through Facebook is positively related to educational attainment, added SWS.
Half of adult Facebook members who read the news daily using the site are college and high school graduates, both 49 percent. This is higher compared to 37 percent among elementary graduates and 36 percent among non-elementary graduates, said the pollster.
SOCIAL MEDIA AND POLITICS
Respondents were also asked if they use social media sites for political activities.
Of the estimated 30.4 million adults who have at least one social media account, 31 percent or 9.4 million individuals use social media to “like or promote material related to political or social issues that others have posted", the survey found.
Meanwhile, 14 percent use it to follow political figures, 6 percent post their opinions on political or social issues, 5 percent re-post political or social content by someone else, and 4 percent share links to political stories or articles, said SWS.
Only 2 percent use social media to encourage other people to take action on important political or social issues, while 1 percent encourage people to vote.
Fifty-one percent or 15.4 million individuals volunteered answers that specified other social media uses and activities, SWS said.
The survey had 1,440 respondents and sampling error margins of ±2.6 percent for national percentages, and ±5 percent for regional figures.
source: news.abs-cbn.com
