Fourth International Conference on Communication & Media Studies

Abstract

In this study we investigated factors affecting one’s ability to distinguish fake from real news. Questionnaires containing a mix of true and fake news on crimes were distributed to two different samples: students at the University of Oslo and senior citizens aged 65-75 living in Norway. The perpetrator in the fake news stories was either an in-group member (Scandinavian) or an immigrant (between-Ss design). The majority of participants in both samples evaluated their ability to distinguish facts from misinformation as better compared to others. Their confidence was not entirely justified as both samples rated the presented fake news as more trustworthy than the real news. Senior citizens trusted both real and fake news more than the students did and the news also elicited more emotions in them (fear, anger, sadness, worry). Simultaneously, they were also more willing to share the content of the news items with others (both via face-to-face communication and online). Whereas younger participants typically reported judging the news accuracy based on formal attributes of the news items (e.g., news source), older participants more frequently focused on the content of the news (how likely such incident could happen). Women in the younger sample trusted all the news items more than men did, whereas there was not such gender difference among senior citizens. Trust in the news items where an immigrant was a perpetrator was affected by participants’ political orientation in both of the samples: right-wingers had a tendency to trust these news items whereas left-wingers distrusted them.