Media Research

Methods
Literature Review (Pair) 15%

Research Title: Confusing Times: The Spread of Fake News

Done By:

Angela Mae Mcasinag S10170762C (T202)

Lee Zi Ying S10172145F (T202)

Introduction

Fake news refers to an article of news that is factually and verifiably wrong, or

is written in a way that might be misleading (Allcott and Gentzkow 213) with

incomplete or out of context information, creating a false belief or conclusion

in the mind of the reader. (Elliot and Culver 69-84)

Our definition rules out opinion pieces and conspiracy theories as they are

difficult to verify (Allcott and Gentzkow 214) and satirical pieces as they often

come with disclaimers.

Fake news is a relatively new term, made popular during the 2016 USA

Presidential Elections. (Allcott and Gentzkow 213) However, the concept of

fake news is a lot older, with the “Great Moon Hoax” by the New York Sun in

1835 being one of the most significant historic examples. (Thornton 89-100)

But why is fake news suddenly growing in popularity now? This is because

our society is becoming increasingly reliant on information on the go, and

hardly fact check, therefore we are more vulnerable to fake news.

Hence, in this literature review, we will be identifying the motives and

consequences of fake news, as well as the demographics of people who

believe in fake news, so that we may find the root of the problem and stop the

spread of fake news.

Literature Review

Question 1: What motives do people have in creating fake news?

With the rise of the Internet, barriers of entry became lower, making it easier

and faster for news to be disseminated via non-traditional platforms, leading

to the rise of Twitter and Facebook as new competition. This has created the

pressure to stay relevant, and to be the first to release breaking news.

(Newman)

However, this has also left many traditional media outlets marred with errors

and inaccuracies in their publications, as the tight deadlines leave no time to

fact check information, and articles are unintentionally published with factual

inaccuracies. (Carson)

An example would be the 2013 Boston Bombings, where CNN and Fox News,

in a rush to be the first, incorrectly reported that the police had made an arrest.

Both news networks had to pull back the story and apologise for their error.

(Carr).

On the flip side, the number of news creators online became too large to be

regulated by the law (Carson), allowing many to get away with creating fake,

hyperbole news motivated by profit and the spreading their own ideology or

believes. (Allcott and Gentzkow 217)

Most of the fake news are created with the sole purpose of instituting Internet
traffic as news websites can earn profit through advertising revenue

measured. Hence, fake news websites purposely create false,

sensationalised news, or “clickbaits”, so that they can attract attention and

collect clicks to generate revenue. (Rubin et al.)

The “godfather of the [fake news] industry”, Jestin Coler reportedly earns

$10,000 to $30,000 a month on advertisements alone (Sydell) while Paul

Horner, a producer of fake news articles makes around $10,000 on AdSense

(Dewey). This shows that the fake news production can be very profitable.

Another reason for online news sources to produce fake news is that the

creators seek to spread an ideology or perpetuate a belief to their audience

(Allcott and Gentzkow 217). This was especially common during the 2016 US

Presidential Election.

Jestin Coler, a liberal and CEO of Disinfomedia, purposely published fictitious

pro-Trump articles on his news websites to denounce and prove that the

alternate-right nationalists were willing to accept blatantly inaccurate and

made-up stories as long as they supported their political cause. (Sydell).

On the other hand, Ovidui Drobota, a Trump supporter created his

“conservative news website”, Ending the Fed was to help Trump win the

election by influencing readers with both real and fake pro-Trump news

(Townsend).
Question 2: What are the consequences of the spread of fake news?

A common type of fake news is one that involves factually inaccurate medical

stories or remedies that have been taken out of context or have been made

up in its entirety. (Johnson 88) According to a survey by the University of

Tennesse, out of 98 Pharmaceutical students, 76% felt that significant

information were excluded while 83% felt that news publications made

erroneous conclusions. (E. et all 3) Additionally, according to the American

National Health Council, 75% of people pay attention to the medical and

health related news on the media (Bonevski). This shows that medical news

often have a very large reach, and fake news articles are likely to promote

inaccurate medical decisions that might have a long term impact on many

people’s lives.

People featured in fake news stories are also affected, as some readers will

believe in the stories and might try to bring justice to the ‘situation’, sometimes

taking things into their own hands and exerting violent behaviour towards

innocent people.

The Pizzagate saga stirred up controversy when it revealed that Hillary

Clinton, was secretly coordinating a child abuse ring with her campaign

manager, in a pizzeria in Washington DC. This fabricated story was

accompanied with other fake articles about Clinton kidnapping, molesting and

trafficking children. Eventually, these articles were deleted, but the damage

was done. The owner and employees of the restaurant reported that they
have been receiving death threats through texts, Facebook and Twitter, (Kang)

but little did they know that a North Carolina man, influenced by the article

would resort to violent means and fire into the restaurant, endangering the

lives of customers and employees. (Siddiqui and Svrluga).

False reporting of news can also have dire consequences on the stock market

and businesses. In 2013, the Associated Press reported in a tweet that then

president, Barack Obama, was injured in an explosion at the White House.

The tweet caused the S&P 500 to plummet by 0.9%, easily clearing $130

billion dollars’ worth of stock value in the market. This demonstrates how

sensitive the businesses are to incorrect reporting of news (Matthews).

Interestingly, fake news did not do much in terms of affecting the political

results of the 2016 Presidental election. Stanford researchers have confirmed

that the surge in pro-Trump and anti-Clinton news stories did not contribute to

Trump’s unexpected win. According to them, if a pro-Trump article were to

change vote shares by 0.02 percentage points, the amount of fake news used

in their study should have resulted in Trump winning by a large margin, much

smaller than his electoral win (Hunt and Gentzkov).

Question 3: Who believes in fake news?

Due to fake news being a relatively new topic, there is still a lack of research

in the demographics of people who believe in fake news. Additionally, studies

like the BuzzFeed survey on fake news results have been excluded due to

unreliable polling methods used during research.

Hence, reliable answers to the question can only be answered by a few

limited sources, with only one source performing studies specific to fake news.

The study was conducted by Stanford researchers, where they conducted an

online survey on more than 30 million participants above the age of 18 in the

United States of America. During the study, they asked demographic

questions, how much time they spent on different media platforms, which

news source they saw as most important and presented participants with real

news headlines, fake news headlines and placebo fake news headlines,

asking them what would have been their best guess on the factual accuracy

of the article at the time of the election (Allcott and Gentzkow 212-213).

The study found that age, time spent using media, segregation of one’s social

network, education level and political affiliation are significant indicators in the

ability to discern fake news from real news (Allcott and Gentzkow 228).

According to the study that older people are better at identifying fake news

from real news. This is supported by a recent study which found that 80% of

American high schoolers could not tell the difference between native

advertisements from a real news story, despite being provided with a

disclaimer (Evaluating Information: The Cornerstone of Civic Online

Reasoning).
Secondly, heavy media users are more likely to believe in a fake news article

that are ideologically aligned with their own (Allcott and Gentzkow 230). This

is likely attributed to selective exposure theory, where heavy media users

expose themselves to content in alignment to their own values and opinions,

creating an echo-chambers (Sears and Freedman). Hence, they would be not

exposed to differing views on a fake news article and are likely to think that a

fake news article is factually accurate.

Similarly, people with segregated social networks often surround themselves

with individuals that share the same values and views with them, decreasing

the chance of exposure to opposing views on the information that they receive

(Allcott and Gentzkow 230).

People with higher education levels have more tools and knowledge at their

disposal and will hence, be more capable in fact-checking information and

discerning between real news and fake news (Allcott and Gentzkow 228).

However, it should be noted that a study by Dartmouth College has shown

that education levels can also be a liability in the ability to distinguish fake

news from real news. The argument is that motivated reasoning has a larger

impact on people with higher education, as they often have more tools to

counter argue against information that they disagree with (Flynn et al. 835-

842).

Adding on, most studies agree that people with partisan groups tend to

believe in fake news articles that are in line with their political viewpoint.
(Allcott and Gentzkow 230) This is likely due to confirmation bias, where

people ignore the flaws of the political figures they support and amplify the

mistakes of the political figures that they dislike. (Lebo and Cassino).

Conclusion

In conclusion, fake news is mainly motivated by profit and is used as a

medium to sell political ideologies. However, fake news also gives rise to

serious problems.

At a personal level, fake news causes long-term effects on the public’s health

and quality of life. At a societal and state level, fake news poses a threat to

societal peace and political stability, as its controversial and unfounded

content might create a volatile and violent environment.

To add on, the four demographics that are less likely to accurately discern

between real news and fake news are the younger demographic, heavy

media users, people who have segregated social networking groups and

people who have partisan groups.

As the demographic profile of people vulnerable to fake news is based on one

study, much of the information is surface level, and more research needs to

be done so that there can be future research into the mitigation measures

against fake news.

(1746 words)
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