Statista's Research on Fake News

Statista, an online research entity based in Germany, has some great figures on fake news and public perception of fake news, the latter referring to media consumers’ levels of trust of social media, mainstream media, and local news. They define fake news as “published hoaxes and misleading information… often shared on social media to increase their reach.” One of the more shocking surveys was a telephone interview conducted in March 2018 among 803 American participants across the United States, all 18 and older. The results were that 52 percent of the respondents think online news sites report fake news regularly, with 34 percent thinking that it is reported occasionally. When combined and extended to the general population, it could mean that 86 percent of Americans think online news sites report fake news. This is an extremely high measurement and gives a good idea of the amount of weariness (or passiveness) among the average adult American news media consumer. [1 image, 3 links, 1 quotation, 158 words]