Americans Who Mainly Get Their News on Social Media Are Less Engaged, Less Knowledgeable
U.S. adults in this group are less likely to get the facts right about COVID-19 and politics and more likely to hear some unproven claims.
Numbers, Facts and Trends Shaping Your World
U.S. adults in this group are less likely to get the facts right about COVID-19 and politics and more likely to hear some unproven claims.
About half of U.S. adults say they get news from social media “often” or “sometimes,” and this use is spread out across a number of different sites. Facebook stands out as a regular source of news for about a third of Americans.
Americans who closely follow political news are more likely to have confidence that the public will accept election results. And that’s true across party boundaries.
Responses to cable news coverage and the pandemic vary notably among Americans who identify Fox News, MSNBC or CNN as their main source of political news.
Both Democrats and Republicans express far more distrust than trust of social media sites as sources for political and election news.
More than half of these social media news consumers say they have encountered made-up news about COVID-19.
The politically aware, digitally savvy and those more trusting of the news media fare better in differentiating factual statements from opinions.
About two-in-three U.S. adults say fake news stories cause a great deal of confusion about the basic facts of current issues. And nearly a quarter say they have ever shared completely made-up news.
A unique study of Americans’ online news habits over the course of a week provides a detailed window into how Americans learn about current events in the digital age.
The past year brought pressures to America’s newspaper newsrooms not seen since the Great Recession. From broadcast to print to digital and more, this year’s annual report takes stock of the state of the news media.
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