Digital literacy and perception of fake news

Abstract

The topic of fake news walked into the spotlight with the 2016 U.S. elections. However, the concept of misinformation has been present far way back than 2016. Fake news is a concept which involves two parties continuously engaged in a basic communication model. Fake news, as a concept, has two perspectives. On one hand, there’s the point of view of the creator. Creating and disseminating fake news to deliberately misinform citizens in a society is somewhat related to propaganda or harm other competitors. On the other hand, there’s the point of view of the reader. The reader is responsible for absorbing the content and has the power to believe or discard the content. This dissertation shall look more into the effects of fake news on its readers, and some precautions that should be taken to prevent the dissemination of fake news. This dissertation will look into critical digital literacy as a key component to battle the spread of fake news. Testing participants’ perceptions was done by means of two-part focus groups. The participants were exposed to fabricated and credible stories and asked questions about their credibility.