Fake News, Misinformation Focus of New Microsite

Social media has evolved into a strong influencer of culture, society, and politics. In addition to connecting individuals around the world, these social media platforms have evolved into breeding grounds for harmful effects on the user. Lacking discrete boundaries between the platform and the user and encourage users to engage with false perceptions of reality are just two potential consequences of this widespread use of mass media. However, recent academic research suggests that initiatives geared toward media literacy may be effective measures in remedying the negative implications. 

As noted on the Information Literacy Microsite, social media literacy examines the “user’s self in social media that is in dynamic causation with their choices of messages and networks.” In a collective effort to address the detrimental impacts of social media, authors Hyunyi Cho, Julie Cannon, Rachel Lopez, and Wenbo Li delve into the concept of empowering individuals to fundamentally alter their relationships with these mass media platforms. And to do so, they specifically highlight the importance of monitoring individual usage of social media apps and the ways in which individuals engage with the content and resources the platforms provide.

This research on the benefits of social media literacy efforts is just one example of the cutting-edge social science research now being offered by Sage on a curated microsite.

The Information Literacy Microsite will be your new home for pressing research on the digital age and the ways to combat mis-, dis-, and misinformation. This collection offers dozens of academic and scholarly research journal articles taken directly from Sage’s library, including a wide array of relevant topics. Microsites like this offer individuals with the opportunity to access research that has captivated the interest of the public. And for researchers, they help to encourage the pursuit of knowledge that lies outside the bounds of existing research.  

Other available research topics offered on the site include: ‘fake news’ and solutions for disinformation; propaganda and the effects on news sharing; censorship and social protests; media ethicacy and control of digital platforms; and digital media literacy and its effects on body dissatisfaction.

A deeper dive into the collection offered on the website provides readers with a glimpse of the knowledge available at their fingertips. In the American Behavior Scientist journal, Paul Mihailidis and Samantha Viotty analyze “Spreadable Spectacle in Digital Culture: Civic Expression, Fake News, and the Role of Media Literacies in “Post-Fact” Society,” while Carlos Diaz Ruiz and Tomas Nilsson examine “Disinformation and Echo Chambers: How Disinformation Circulates on Social Media Through Identity-Driven Controversies” in the Journal of Public Policy & Marketing. For a taste of research on propaganda, Anthony DiMaggio details “Conspiracy Theories and the Manufacture of Dissent: Qanon, the ‘Big Life’, Covid-19, and the Rise of Rightwing Propaganda” and Saif Shahin takes on “News, Nations, and Power Relations: How Neoliberal Media Reproduce a Hierarchical World Order” – both of which can be found in the Critical Sociology journal.