In 2025, more than 3,000 journalism students across the Nordic region are participating in what is likely the world’s most comprehensive and long-running study of journalism students and their professional orientations. The Nordic Journalism Students Project – known also as Hovdabrekka – brings together 26 major institutions from across the Nordic countries to examine students’ perspectives on journalism, their education, media habits, and professional values.
Over the past twenty years, the project has offered a rare, long-term view of how journalism students’ ideals and expectations evolve in response to wider changes in the media landscape.
“The undertaking was initiated at the Nordic Conference for Journalism Teachers in Hovdabrekka, Iceland, in September 2004, when a group of scholars and lecturers agreed to conduct a comparative quantitative study of journalism students across the Nordic region. Prior to this initiative, systematic knowledge about Nordic journalism students was largely absent”, explains Jan Fredrik Hovden from the University of Bergen, Norway.
The project stands out internationally for its collaborative scope, longevity, and commitment. It has been sustained entirely without external funding, relying instead on the Nordic principle of dugnad – collective voluntary effort in support of a shared goal.
The project stands out internationally for its collaborative scope, longevity, and commitment.
The spirit of cooperation has not only ensured its continuity but also strengthened its capacity to capture change over time.
Revealing Shifts in Journalistic Ideals
Two decades on, the project continues to provide valuable insight into how future journalists view their role in society and how their ideals adapt to a changing media environment.
As Jari Väliverronen, a member of the Hovdabrekka group from Tampere University, Finland, notes:
“The first groups of students surveyed in the early 2000s came of age before social media, before smartphones, and before ‘fake news’ became a political weapon. Today’s students have grown up in a completely different information environment – shaped by algorithms, digital disinformation, and a struggling traditional media industry. Their media habits have changed just as dramatically: News is now consumed through personalised feeds, social platforms, and influencers rather than newspapers or broadcast channels. By comparing data across time, we can trace how these shifts shape students’ sense of professional identity, their ethical perspectives, and the kind of journalism they want to produce”.
Seen against this backdrop, the previous Hovdabrekka studies have shown how journalism students’ views in the Nordics became overall more homogenous from 2005 to 2012. During this period, traditional ideals such as objectivity and neutrality lost ground, while investigative journalism emerged as a stronger professional aspiration. Broadcasting also overtook newspapers as the most attractive future workplace among students.
Seen against this backdrop, the previous Hovdabrekka studies have shown how journalism students’ views in the Nordics became overall more homogenous from 2005 to 2012.
Nonetheless, variations persisted. In many cases, these differences were more closely linked to gender and institutional affiliation than to nationality. Female students across the Nordics tended to show greater interest in social and health-related topics, while male students were more inclined toward sports journalism.
Bureaucratic Hurdles
Despite its strong foundation, the 2025 edition faced significant administrative challenges.
The introduction of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in 2016 has created complex requirements for handling data across multiple countries and institutions. In the Hovdabrekka project, coordinating compliance across five national legal frameworks proved particularly demanding.
Despite their relatively similar backgrounds, the Nordics differ in their practical interpretations of GDPR. This led to complicated and protracted negotiations about required documentation, permissions, and contracts.
In the end, the necessary paperwork took slightly over a year and required “strong cross-border cooperation and immense patience from everyone involved”, recalls one project member.
“There were moments when we were close to giving up”, another member acknowledges. “If we had known how complicated GDPR would make it, we might never have dared to start”.
Yet, as one researcher later reflected, “we spent a year in the paperwork, but we came out with stronger partnerships and a project we still believe in”.
The 2025 survey will continue throughout the autumn. Results are expected to be published in academic journals and as condensed tables and graphs on the project website (https://hovdabrekka.wordpress.com), where further information about the project and previous publications can also be found.
Photo: André Tomter, UiB.