Editorial Guidelines
This section contains quantitative and qualitative research published by the BBC Trust which examines various aspects of the BBC's editorial values and standards. This includes research commissioned to inform our impartiality reviews and the Editorial Guidelines Review.
Impartiality
The Agreement accompanying the BBC Charter requires the BBC to do all it can to ensure controversial subjects are treated with due impartiality in news and other output dealing with matters of public policy or political or industrial controversy. The Editorial Guidelines also include a commitment to apply due impartiality across all subjects.
Principles of impartiality-
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The Trust published a report commissioned jointly by the preceding body of the BBC Governors and the BBC Executive which identified the key challenges and risks to impartiality. A key part of this work was extensive qualitative audience research to explore how audiences view impartiality across the range of BBC output and genres in order to help develop some guiding principles.
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Reviews
The Trust regularly reviews key topics in order to assess how well the BBC is reporting them with due impartiality and accuracy. Where appropriate, we have supported this assessment with specific research to provide the audience perspective.
Reviews-
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- Audience attitudes to BBC Network coverage of the devolved Nations, PDF (192KB)
- Audience attitudes to BBC Network coverage of the devolved Nations, text only (48KB)
- Audience attitudes to coverage of business on BBC news, PDF (623KB)
- Audience attitudes to coverage of business on BBC news, text only (107KB)
- Audience attitudes to BBC coverage of Israeli/Palestinian conflict, PDF(452KB)
- Audience attitudes to BBC coverage of Israeli/Palestinian conflict, text only (114KB)
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Editorial Guidelines
Review of the BBC's revised Editorial Guidelines-
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The Editorial Guidelines are primarily an aid for programme makers and others making content for the BBC. However, it is important that the standards set out in the Guidelines reflect the expectations of the public. The BBC Trust commissioned Kantar Media to conduct a large scale qualitative study across the nations and regions of the UK among a diverse range of people, including traditionally hard-to-reach and hard-to-research audiences. The study combined a range of methods and techniques to research complex issues related to the editorial guidelines of accuracy, impartiality, and harm and offence.
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Taste and standards-
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In response to a request from the BBC Trust in June 2009 the BBC Executive commissioned a report exploring public attitudes to morality, values and behaviour in UK broadcasting. The research involved people of all age ranges discussing a wide range of programmes, including comedy, entertainment, documentary and drama.
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Trust in media
Trust in media-
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In November 2007, the Trust commissioned a qualitative research project into the public's understanding and perception of trust in television broadcasting. The research explored: attitudes to various aspects of life to better understand levels of trust, cynicism and engagement; the present attitudes and perceptions of broadcasters in terms of trust, following press coverage; and attitudes to editorial principles or programme-making practices.
- Trust in Broadcasting, PDF (71KB)
- Trust in Broadcasting, text only (39KB)
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