Lifestyle Journalism

Lifestyle sections generally were introduced into American daily newspapers in the 1970s and typically evolved from what had been styled as women's pages. Despite an assumption that we can all identify what “lifestyle” might mean, most newspaper definitions are still in flux as editors seek to define what it is that readers might want to read (and what advertisers will support). Some papers have lifestyle sections that could be defined as entertainment or celebrity driven—not much of a change in philosophy from the old women's/society sections which concentrated on the doings of the local rich and influential. Lifestyle sections themselves are sometimes listed separately and sometimes classified as part of feature pages. Sometimes they are not included in current staff listings at all; indeed, it is instructive to see how newspaper structure has changed by studying the listings in Editor & Publisher Year Book. In 1976, in the middle of the decade introducing much of the change, out of 1,325 daily newspapers listed, only 48 included features editors, and lifestyle sections were represented in just nine papers (three as lifestyle and five as life/style). In contrast, during the same year, there were 706 society editors listed and 758 women's editors.

These figures suggest that change and experimentation with the old structures were just beginning, as the names of new editor categories also illustrate: Viva, Scene, View, Today, People, Accent, and of course Style, the section at The Washington Post that has been credited with leading the lifestyle revolution in newspapers. That what resulted was no “revolution” is clear by looking at the [Page 851]Editor & Publisher daily newspaper listings 30 years later in 2006. Even though the accepted historical view is that lifestyle sections have replaced women's and society pages, this is true only in major metropolitan areas or cities closely linked to these areas. For example, in 2006, only 152 of 1,245 dailies listed a “lifestyle” section editor, with an additional 42 listed as “living/lifestyle” editors. Two more offered the reverse “lifestyle/living,” another 10 were listed as “living” editors, and 17 were listed as “life” section editors, bringing this group to a total of only 221 lifestyle-type editors. Women's and society editors show a real decline, however they are still present with 265 entries. Going back decade by decade suggests that the transition came for most papers around the turn of the century and that the real change has been in the number of features editors—from 48 in 1976 to 431 in 2006, but still not as many as the 691 women's and society editors listed in 1976.