Elderly and conservative are more likely to spread fake content, study finds | World

The article – signed by Andrew Guess of Princeton University, and Jonathan Nagler and Joshua Tucker of the University of New York (NYU), both located in the United States – has was published Wednesday by the scientific journal Science Advances (9). The authors badyzed the publications of a group of Facebook users during the 2016 US presidential campaign.

The survey found that, in general, "the sharing of Articles on dummy content sites was a rare activity ". . "The vast majority of Facebook users in our database (91.5%) have not revealed fake content portals articles in 2016," the authors say.

But the study found that older group users, over the age of 65, shared seven times more articles from fake content portals than the younger ones (18-29 years).

Among those who broadcast fake content, there were more voters from the Republican Party (38 users) – President Donald Trump's political group – than from the Democratic Party (17). In total, 18.1% of Republican voters badyzed by the study reported fake content, compared to 3.5% of Democratic voters.

To define which sites were "false news" broadcasters, the authors relied on lists of academics and journalists, including journalist Craig Silverman's BuzzFeed portal.

The Influence of "False News" on Elections

The Trump Election – as well as that of Jair Bolsonaro (PSL) in Brazil – was marked by discussions on the issue. possible influence of so-called false information, if they were real information, often to generate advertising revenue.

Some badysts said that such content had an impact that could have affected the results of the 2016 US elections. However, the authors of the article say that studies indicate that these arguments "are exaggerated" .

The survey also indicates that people sharing more information were generally less likely to disclose fake content. "These data are consistent with the badumption that people sharing many links are more aware of what they see and are better able to distinguish the wrong content from the news," says l & # 39; study.

The authors point out, however, that it was not possible to know if the participants knew that they were disclosing false content.