The journalistic coverage of Russiagate, between 2017 and March 2019, has been described as ‘a catastrophic media failure’. Drawing on political and social psychology, this article seeks to enrich, and refresh, the familiar journalistic concepts of agenda-setting, framing and priming by combining them under the heading of the ‘news narrative’. Using this interdisciplinary approach to media effects theory, Russiagate is considered in terms of the Illusory Truth Effect and the Innuendo Effect. These effects hypothesise that the more audiences are exposed to information, the more likely they are to believe it – even when they are told that the information is unreliable. As a specific example, we focus on the stance taken by BBC News – which has an obligation to journalistic impartiality. We ask what implications arise from this analysis with regard to audience trust.

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This article draws on cognitive science to make an important distinction between knowledge and understanding. Doing so shines a light on the nature of the news narrative, and brings a fresh perspective to the often blurred distinction between fact and opinion. It is argued that the arrow of journalism should point in one direction; from the reporting of factual news, to interpretation and the construction of news narratives. However this direction is increasingly reversed, leading journalists to privilege stories which support their pre-existing narratives. The result is that contemporary journalism often produces "factinion", a confusing mixture of fact and opinion. The article develops the idea that Narrative-Led Journalism is "fake journalism"; a genre of realist-factual entertainment, or 'info-therapy'. In an increasingly partisan and tribal public sphere, fake journalism provides comforting reinforcement of existing world views, to the detriment of journalism which promotes independent judgement, and the search for truth. Narrative-Led Journalism therefore has implications for democracy; it leaves us vulnerable to the tyranny of explanation.

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