By Sandra Oshiro
The Poynter Institute
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — Journalism executives and other participants at Poynter’s Future of News Audiences conference heard Sunday night what some would have preferred not to hear: younger generations simply aren’t growing into dedicated consumers of news the way their parents and grandparents did.
As young adults age and begin families, the theory goes, they start to care more about the world around them and read the news — a development that would help reverse the fortunes of news organizations which have seen precipitous declines in their audience numbers. But this may be a false hope — so far there is no “life cycle” effect, at least none that can be detected…