Conferring Resistance to Digital Disinformation: The Inoculating Influence of Procedural News Knowledge

The Psychology of Fake News

“…This suggests that, in cases where people actually do stop and think, relevant prior knowledge is likely to be a critical factor. Consistent with this suggestion, political knowledge was associated with an increased capacity to discern between true and false news content in an Italian sample [30], as were media literacy [57] and general information literacy [58]; and science knowledge in the context of (mis)information about COVID-19 [19,59].…”

News in an Era of Content Confusion: Effects of News Use Motivations and Context on Native Advertising and Digital News Perceptions

“…Previously shown to influence NA recognition (Amazeen & Wojdynski, 2018; Howe & Teufel, 2014), age was measured using an open-ended question ( M = 35.60, SD = 10.08). Knowledge about news practices/operations (procedural news knowledge) has been demonstrated to play a role in helping people identify and resist online covert advertising attempts (Amazeen & Bucy, 2019) and was based upon summing correct responses to three multiple choice questions about press releases, social media, and public media (see Supplemental Appendix C for question wording) that each had one correct answer. All three questions were correctly answered by 41% of the participants, one in three answered two correctly, 19% answered only one correctly, and 7% answered none of the questions correctly ( M = 2.08, SD = 0.93).…”

“…After reverse-coding for consistent word polarity (with lower scores indicating less credibility), the five items were averaged to form a composite measure of perceived credibility of the political article (α = .90, M = 4.99, SD = 1.28). (Amazeen & Bucy, 2019) and was based upon summing correct responses to three multiple choice questions about press releases, social media, and public media (see online Appendix C for question wording) that each had one correct answer. All three questions were correctly answered by 41% of participants, one in three answered two correctly, 19% answered only one correctly, and 7% answered none of the questions correctly (M = 2.08, SD = 0.93).…”

“…It follows, then, that those with a greater understanding of what news is should be better able to discriminate journalistic content from imposter content and use this knowledge in deciding whether to engage with or avoid a message (Wojdynski & Evans, 2019). Indeed, individuals with greater procedural news knowledge—an understanding of news gathering practices—are better able to identify and resist online disinformation efforts such as fabricated news and covert advertising attempts (Amazeen & Bucy, 2019).…”

Deciding What’s News: News-ness As an Audience Concept for the Hybrid Media Environment

“…Finally, recent attacks on the news media and use of the term “fake news,” which has garnered substantial public and academic attention (Amazeen & Bucy, 2019; Lazer et al, 2018), highlight the importance of understanding how audiences recognize news and its meaning. If news holds little meaning among the public, then calling something “fake news” would have little impact.…”