Positive News is asking a question that journalism has rarely paused to consider: what if the news actually reflected what matters most to the people it serves?
Starting today, the UK-based news organisation is launching a seven-week listening project called Positive News: What Next? to explore that question. At its core lies a striking observation: traditional news culture emphasises status, competition, wealth and power as markers of what matters. But values research consistently shows that most people place greater importance on community, equality, connection, care for others and care for the natural world. The gap between what the media amplifies and what people actually value reveals something fundamental about how journalism shapes our sense of reality.
Every day, news organisations make choices about what deserves attention. Politics, crime, war and the economy dominate the agenda, often told through lenses of conflict, crisis, threat and division. These issues are important, but over time, what media focuses on shapes what people notice, what they believe others care about, what they think is possible, and how much agency they feel they have. Journalism is never neutral—there are always choices about what to cover, whose voices are heard, and what relationship with the world those choices encourage.
Positive News is exploring an emerging framework called values-aware journalism: the premise that all journalism reflects values, and that editorial choices—conscious or not—shape people's sense of what matters. The organisation is launching its flagship Positive News values survey today, drawing on Schwartz's theory of basic human values, a long-established framework used by social psychologists to understand what principles motivate how people see the world. Participants will receive a personal values profile showing the principles that shape their worldview.
This matters at a particular moment. Trust in media is low, many people feel overwhelmed by news, and digital content increasingly competes for attention through outrage, anxiety, distraction and disinformation. Positive News wants to understand what people are genuinely looking for from journalism in this climate—and whether current media structures actually serve those needs.
The organisation itself is already structured as a community benefit society, a form of co-operative designed to serve the public rather than private shareholders. This next phase aims to build on that purpose by exploring how more of its work can be shaped around community and shared values—from the stories it covers and ways audiences participate, to services and experiences it creates beyond journalism.
Positive News has long championed constructive journalism: reporting that builds a fuller picture of reality and empowers people, not by ignoring problems but by focusing on progress, solutions and human potential. This listening project extends that thinking. The question now isn't just what positive stories should be published, but what makes journalism genuinely useful? What makes something newsworthy? These questions can only be answered by better understanding what communities actually value and need.
Throughout the seven-week project, Positive News will share what it learns through regular updates. At the end, it will publish a full account of what it heard and how those insights are shaping its next chapter. Ultimately, this is about something larger than which stories to cover: what does a media organisation that truly benefits its community actually look like? With community input, Positive News hopes to find out.