Can news help? New evidence on the links between news use and misinformation
"Our findings challenge the notion that, by drawing attention to false content, news leave people more misinformed," writes Rasmus Nielsen
The Oxford Martin Programme on
Misinformation, Science and Media
The Challenge
Long-held scientific consensus on vital issues such as climate change or the vaccines is increasingly contested, heavily debated on social media and even in the mainstream news media. New technological innovations like artificial intelligence are discussed in terms that veer from the alarmist to the exuberant.
Public understanding of key issues in science and technology is often limited and misinformation about basic issues in science and technology - from natural selection to global warming - abounds.
How can we better understand public discussions of science and technology, and what can be done to improve them?
In this three-year programme researchers from the Oxford Internet Institute and the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism are examining the interplay between systematic misinformation campaigns, news coverage, and increasingly important social media platforms for public understanding of science and technological innovation. The programme looks at the problem of “junk science”, “fake news” and public policy issues.
We focus on three questions:
- How does the public’s understanding of science and technology vary from country to country and how is this variation related to differences in media use?
- How do misinformation campaigns on social media influence public learning about science and technology?
- How can scientists, journalists, and policy makers be better at communicating about science and new innovations, so as to contribute to evidence‐based policy making and respond to misinformation and junk science?
Until now, understanding of the interplay between the public, misinformation campaigns, and social media has been limited, and research carried out has focused on elections and candidates for public office rather than broader but equally important issues of science communication.
Our aim is to combine social science and computer science to address the damaging impact of computational propaganda and other forms of digitally‐enabled misinformation campaigns on scientific innovation, policy making, and public life. We engage with stakeholders in journalism, the technology industry, the scientific community, and among policymakers in the search for evidence-based actionable interventions.
Oxford Martin Initiative on Vaccine Misinformation
In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, Professor Phil Howard launched a new related initiative to help counter the spread of misleading health information, particularly around COVID-19 vaccinations.
The Oxford Martin Initiative on Vaccine Misinformation will build on the team’s existing data science infrastructure to understand the extent of false content on social media and measure the effectiveness of public health communication in real‐time. This research will be used to advise the Government and the NHS on how to use social media to deflate anti‐vaccine misinformation and promote public understanding of both the vaccination and health guidelines.
latest news
Four new initiatives launched to support ‘Building Back Better’ from COVID-19
The Oxford Martin School has launched four new solutions-focused research initiatives, designed to make an immediate difference in helping the world ‘build back better’ from the COVID-19 pandemic.
Navigating the COVID-19 'infodemic' - how are people accessing news and information?
A new report from the Oxford Martin School's Misinformation, Science and Media programme analyses how people in six countries - Argentina, Germany, South Korea, Spain, the UK and the US) - accessed news and information about COVID-19 in the early stages of the global pandemic.
The COVID-19 ‘infodemic’: what does the misinformation landscape look like and how can we respond?
featured publication
How UK Media Cover Artificial Intelligence
In this factsheet, we analyse eight months of reporting on artificial intelligence (AI), in six mainstream news outlets in the United Kingdom, to understand how AI is emerging as a public issue.