TY - JOUR
T1 - Too good to be true, too good not to share
T2 - the social utility of fake news
AU - Duffy, Andrew
AU - Tandoc, Edson
AU - Ling, Rich
N1 - Funding Information:
This work was supported by the Singapore Ministry of Education under grant number MOE2015-T2-1-042.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2019 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
PY - 2020
Y1 - 2020
N2 - While fake news has been widely reviled as an attack on democracy, less has been written about its threat to interpersonal relationships. Social networks have become increasingly popular for sharing news and as a result have also offered fertile ground for the spread of fake news. This paper considers the impact of the latter on the former, particularly in circumstances where the sharer either does not know or does not suspect that the news they are sharing is fake. This distinction is important because while sharing information and news may be construed as a social good, sharing news that turns out to be fake might negatively impact relationships. How do people react when the news they have shared with the intention of fostering social cohesion turns out to be fake, and as a result damages that cohesion? Based on 12 focus groups, this study examines how social media users react to fake news and how it affects interpersonal relationships between sender and receiver.
AB - While fake news has been widely reviled as an attack on democracy, less has been written about its threat to interpersonal relationships. Social networks have become increasingly popular for sharing news and as a result have also offered fertile ground for the spread of fake news. This paper considers the impact of the latter on the former, particularly in circumstances where the sharer either does not know or does not suspect that the news they are sharing is fake. This distinction is important because while sharing information and news may be construed as a social good, sharing news that turns out to be fake might negatively impact relationships. How do people react when the news they have shared with the intention of fostering social cohesion turns out to be fake, and as a result damages that cohesion? Based on 12 focus groups, this study examines how social media users react to fake news and how it affects interpersonal relationships between sender and receiver.
KW - Fake news
KW - interpersonal relationships
KW - news sharing
KW - online news
KW - social media
KW - social network
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85066971926&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1080/1369118X.2019.1623904
DO - 10.1080/1369118X.2019.1623904
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85066971926
SN - 1369-118X
VL - 23
SP - 1965
EP - 1979
JO - Information Communication and Society
JF - Information Communication and Society
IS - 13
ER -