"Our findings challenge the notion that, by drawing attention to false content, news leave people more misinformed," writes Rasmus Nielsen
News, at its best, helps people become more informed and thus potentially more resilient to misinformation, propaganda, and other attempts to lead them astray.
As Alessandra Galloni, the editor-in-chief of Reuters, put it earlier this month, “At its best, fact-based journalism can serve as an antidote to the disinformation that clogs up social media platforms more and more”.
This observation is not just central to how many journalists and editors like to think about their work. It is also an effect of news media use known from decades of research documenting how news – despite its imperfections – demonstrably helps people be more knowledgeable about politics and public affairs.
This is especially important in a context where the informational benefits of relying on digital media, including platforms such as social media, search engines and the like, are much less clear, where much of the public is concerned about whether the information they come across online is true or false, and where misinformation clearly sometimes has wide reach on platforms including Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, WhatsApp, and their smaller competitors.
But does news in fact help counter and contain misinformation problems?
We can’t simply assume that. Whatever the aims and intentions of editors and journalists, whatever you might hear in after-dinner speeches and...
Turkish base fake news in Armenia For several days, a video has been circulating on social media claiming that Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan allegedly signed a “secret agreement” with EU ...