How Social Media Effects our Perception of News

By John Tiglianidis

JRN100 Staff Reporter 

 Most Americans feel that social media negatively affects the news that they consume, according to a 2020 Pew Research Center study “64% of Americans say social media have a mostly negative effect on the way things are going in our country”.  

Across the political spectrum, researchers found that most people have a negative relationship with social media. Around 78 percent of Republicans surveyed said that social media hurts the way things are going in the country, while 53 percent of Democrats said the same. 

 According to the study, Democrats have a slightly more positive relationship with social media, 53 percent is still the majority.

 Only 10 percent of the total respondents say that social media has a mostly positive effect on the way things are going in our country.

                                                        Source: Pew Research Center 

Anwar Mhajne, a political science professor at Stonehill College has done extensive research on how social media affects the news that is ultimately released. Mhajne teaches a course called “Politics of Fake News” which goes into deep detail about the history of fake news. 

“In my class, we think about how historically information has been utilized as a tactic of war. Which we call ‘an information war’. Specifically, before the modern-day we look at the Soviet Union since they were the ones who used fake news most extensively,” said Mhajne. 

She said the phrases “misinformation” and “disinformation” were the most important things to know about fake news. 

“Disinformation is actively creating false information. So a government or entity knowing the information is false, creates a story for political or any other purpose that might be. Then misinformation is when you see a piece of false media and share it not knowing it is false,” said Mhajne. 

 

The individuals interviewed in the Pew Research Center study refer to misinformation as the largest reason for their negative views on social media. 

Mhajne said that misinformation is the sharing or creation of false information regardless of intent to harm, meaning that some people aren’t purposefully misinforming their followers. They are only resharing information they believe to be true. The people sharing the information have themselves become victims of fake news. People have been misled by the misinformation that is being spread through social media. This is a common way that misinformation is seen on social media. 

 About one in ten respondents in the Pew Research study said news on the internet can misleading and can be confusing for the reader. 

“We have the Russian Internet Research Agency. They do a lot of work creating bots, They create fake Facebook, Twitter, and other accounts that produce fake news,” said Mhajne. 

A lot of disinformation regarding political issues comes from international intervention. Namely, Russia uses social media and bots on social media to further push false and dangerous narratives to the American people. 

 

According to the Pew Research Center, some respondents cited disinformation on the Coronavirus pandemic on social media as a reason to distrust the news. 

“Social media is rampant with misinformation both about the coronavirus and political and social issues, and the social media organizations do not do enough to combat this.” said a woman, 26, interviewed in the Pew Research study. 

 

One effect of hundreds of thousands of bots across the internet spewing is the creation of an echo chamber. 

According to the Oxford Dictionary an echo chamber is “an environment where a person only encounters beliefs or opinions that match their own.” 

Kyle McGrath, a political science major at Stonehill College has done research into echo chambers and the way they affect individuals. 

“It’s hard to break out of echo chambers. It is hard to take a step back to see what people you don’t agree with are saying. It’s tough because social media is so polarized. The larger media corporations we trust use social media to solidify echo chambers,” said McGrath.

He said consumers tend to make friends and surround themselves with people with similar ideals as they have, which is a form of the echo chamber. But where this becomes more dangerous is when the consumer dismisses all other opinions and only ever listens to people who agree with them. This can be incredibly dangerous to people. individuals can fall into echo chambers of fake news such as “QAnon”.

“Social media is neither positive nor negative. It all just depends on how you use it. As an example, I have cultivated my Twitter account so that I get news from all sides of politics. You can’t understand a news story or issue until you see what many sources are saying about the topic,” said McGrath. 

Mhajne agreed that social media can be used to expand ideas rather than narrow them if it is used in a healthy way. 

“A great way to make sure we are using social media properly is to diversify our news sources. Avoid what other people are saying, look at what news sources are reporting. You can look at what both Fox News and CNN are saying from different perspectives. Do background research on issues before forming an opinion,” said Mhajne.