Attitudes to automated and human written sport journalism

Automation processes are increasingly being applied to the area of sports journalism. This study examines differences in the perceptions regarding human written and automated match texts using an experimental design with n = 251 Australian sports fans. Results showed that human-written articles rated higher on measures related to enjoyment and liking. Differences in arousal and quality were not significant across the match report content. Importantly for media organizations, perceived differences were prominent for all individuals, not just those who read match reports more frequently. Results suggest that perceptions of ‘enjoyment’ and ‘liking’ differ significantly between human written and automated texts; human-written reports were rated as more ‘enjoyable’ and ‘liked’ than automatically generated reports.<p></p>