A study has found that 76 percent of people living in regional Australia trust the ABC to deliver balanced, accurate and reliable news.

RadioInfo reports that 73 percent of those surveyed believed the ABC had a “good and realistic interest in, and understanding of, all aspects of regional Australia”.

The study was commissioned by the Page Research Centre and conducted by Compass Polling.

It found that 59 percent of those surveyed listened to ABC Radio regularly, compared to 36 percent who listened to commercial radio.

When it came to news, 25 percent listened at least once a week to commercial radio news and 21 percent to ABC Radio news.

A total of 97 percent said they listened to radio at least once a week. Of these, 38 percent listened to their Local ABC radio station each week, while many others listened to a selection of programmes across other ABC networks.

Asked to comment on the study, the ABC said its own research, which included all its platforms, indicated that 71.1 percent of regional Australians accessed the ABC each week.