Males dominate podcasting : NPR

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Witthaya Prasongsin/Getty Photos Practically a 3rd of all Individuals hearken to or watch podcasts each week — however far most of the time, it is males's voices that they are listening to. In keeping with a brand new examine from researchers on the USC Annenberg Inclusion Initiative, podcast hosts skew closely male, and so do their visitors.

The researchers dug into information from over 600 of the most well-liked podcasts of 2024, utilizing information from Spotify. They discovered that inside the high 100, practically two-thirds had been hosted by males — and practically three-quarters of all visitors had been male, too. Ladies are significantly underrepresented within the enterprise, tech, sports activities, health, and comedy genres.

The podcast genres that had been most steadily hosted by girls embody true crime, arts, society and tradition (which the researchers put into one class), information and training.

The researchers additionally discovered that over 77% of the highest 100 hosts had been white — leaving a number of communities out of the dialog.

The Annenberg analysis factors out that inside the High 100 podcasts from 2024, solely 11 feminine hosts had been from racially underrepresented backgrounds. A number of of them are present or former NPR anchors.

The researchers say the gender and racial inequities they've recognized within the podcasting area are far better than in comparable analysis they've performed within the film, TV and music industries. In keeping with their most up-to-date information, solely 22.3% of podcast hosts come from underrepresented teams; in contrast, greater than 44% of each common actors on TV sequence and artists working in widespread music are individuals aside from white males, whereas 25.2% of actors main or co-leading movies are from underrepresented teams.

"Podcasting's energy lies in its potential as a democratized medium, the place anybody with an concept and a microphone can discover an viewers," mentioned Stacy L. Smith, the workforce's lead creator and founding father of the Annenberg Inclusion Initiative, in a press launch. " Because the format matures, that accessibility may help problem the previous patterns of leisure and pave the best way for a extra inclusive audio panorama."