From Uninformed to Disinformed Citizens? Comparing Western Information Environments.

The campaigns for the 2016 U.S. presidential election and the U.K. vote to leave the European Union ("Brexit") have increased the discussion about the potential influence of online disinformation. Disinformation is understood here as content disseminated to purposefully mislead recipients. Several authors argue that the phenomenon has gained more influence through social media but that the discussion around it is politicized and in need of clarity. A U.S. post-election study by Allcott and Gentzkow (2017) found that heavy users of social media were not well equipped to identify false information. This finding caused some concern, given that currently, 62 percent of Americans obtain their news via Facebook (Gottfried & Shearer, 2016). However, empirical evidence regarding the rise of online disinformation and its effects on society is inconclusive, and little is known about the situation outside the U.S. Against this background, this project aims to assess the extent of the problem in Western Europe compared to the U.S. More precisely, we aim to find out which actors spread false information, how disinformation is consumed and perceived, and which societal groups are most susceptible to being affected by it. A thorough review of the research literature on online disinformation has allowed us to develop a conceptual framework and a set of hypotheses that will be empirically tested. With an international team based at the universities of Zurich and Antwerp, we will analyze the problem in six countries (Switzerland, Belgium, France, Germany, the U.K., and the U.S.) from several perspectives. The plan is to begin our joint project with a representative survey in order to explore usage and exposure to online disinformation. We will analyze the use of political information on social media and individual characteristics of users. Subsequently, we will focus on the group of users most susceptible to disinformation. In a second step, we will conduct survey experiments with this group in order to find out why participants read, share, and believe false information. Finally, we will conduct a computer-assisted content analysis of social media posts hyper-partisan news outlets, political actors and movements, and accompanying user comments. The goal of this last step is to detect which actors spread disinformation and how this kind of political information is communicated to users. The expected results of our study will make a strong contribution to the emerging research field on mediated disinformation. By using a multi-method design, we will be able to provide empirical evidence on the spread and effects of online disinformation within different national contexts. Moreover, our results will inform policy makers and media professionals dealing with the question of how to combat the increasing disinformation on social media. The Digital Society Initiative of the University of Zurich (www.dsi.uzh.ch) endorses this project and will actively support us in disseminating our findings to the public.

Keywords:NEWS CONTENT, INFORMATION PROCESSING, POLITICAL COMMUNICATION

Disciplines:Political communication, Organisation of information and knowledge resources, Journalism studies