Public Beliefs about Falsehoods in News

Abstract

The circulation of misinformation, lies, propaganda, and other kinds of falsehood has, to varying degrees, become a challenge to democratic publics. We are interested in the question of what publics believe about their own exposure to falsehoods in news, and about what contributes to similarities and differences in these beliefs across countries. We are also interested in the question of whether publics report attempting to verify news that is suspect to them. Here we report on a comparative election survey in the United States, the United Kingdom, and France. We find three key predictors of publics' beliefs that they have been exposed to falsehoods: discussion of news, use of social media for political purposes, and exposure to counter-attitudinal information. The nexus between these three predictors and beliefs about falsehoods exists in all three countries, as we anticipate that it likely exists elsewhere. We do not find voters on the right to be different from those on the left in the United Kingdom and France, but do find a substantial difference in the United States, which is likely due to the 2016 Trump campaign. We conclude with concerns about the imbalance in beliefs about exposure to falsehoods in the United States and the apparent capacity of a single leader, in the right context, to shape public beliefs about what is to be believed.

Digital Threats to Democracy: Comparative Lessons and Possible Remedies

“…Third, Trump voters are more confident in their own ability to identify misinformation as untrue on its face (as opposed to relying on contextual cues such as an unfamiliar source or the presence of spelling and grammatical errors). Koc-Michalska and colleagues’ (2020) study thus suggests that Trump largely succeeded in his campaign to sow distrust in the news in ways that his counterparts in France and the United Kingdom had not yet accomplished, at least by 2017 when the data were collected.…”

“…Moreover, hate and toxicity are used by partisan activists and supporters to intimidate and silence political opponents in ways that disproportionately affect traditionally marginalized groups (Sobieraj 2019; Udupa et al 2020; see also Whitten-Woodring et al 2020 in this special issue). Mass electorates are increasingly concerned with the spread of misinformation and disinformation (as documented in this special issue by Koc-Michalska et al 2020), to the point that many doubt whether news can be trusted, question whether truth can be discerned in public debate, or withdraw from the news altogether to stay out of trouble (Vaccari and Chadwick 2020). This may have detrimental effects on satisfaction for democracy and belief in the legitimacy of this complex project (as highlighted in this special issue by Stoycheff 2020).…”

“…While these issues have dominated public and scholarly debates since 2016, research on the extent and sources of the problem has yielded conflicting results. Koc-Michalska and colleagues’ (2020) contribution sheds light on this topic based on surveys in France, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Discussion of news, use of social media for political purposes, and exposure to counter-attitudinal information consistently predict reported exposure to false information across all three countries.…”

Percepciones sobre medios de comunicación y desinformación: ideología y polarización en el sistema mediático español

“…En el contexto europeo se han llevado a cabo estudios con resultados similares entre votantes de partidos de extrema derecha, si bien no de forma tan extensa (Bennett;Livingstone, 2018). En un reciente estudio comparativo no se demuestra que en Francia y Reino Unido los votantes de extrema derecha tengan una mayor percepción de estar expuestos a desinformación, como sí sucede entre los votantes de Trump en 2016 (Koc-Michalska et al, 2020). Sin embargo, en una investigación realizada en Francia, Alemania, Reino Unido y Suiza, Schulz, Wirth y Müller (2020) encuentran conexiones entre posicionamientos o actitudes populistas y una mayor desconfianza en los medios de comunicación, constatación que también aparece en estudios anteriores (Mitchell et al, 2018).…”

“Strategic Lying”: The Case of Brexit and the 2019 U.K. Election

“…Accusations that politicians lie are far from new, but the intensity of such accusations has increased. As Koc-Michalska et al (2020) note, "Democratic public spheres now present people with falsehoods to an extent that is likely unprecedented since the rise of modern media systems" (461). This paper argues that an overt form of "strategic lying" emerged in the United Kingdom during the 2016 Brexit Referendum, the 2019 U.K. general election, and Trump's presidential campaigns, which has taken "spin" to a new level.…”