January 2024

How can we tackle the ongoing challenge of so-called ‘fake news’? Gianfranco Polizzi, PhD Researcher in the Department of Media at Communications at LSE, argues that we all have a responsibility to learn critical literacy to help us better to evaluate information, both on- and offline, and here sets out the responsibilities held by the different actors involved. This post was first published on the London School of Economics’ Media Policy Project Blog.

Kids spend between 6 to 9 hours online daily, excluding the time they spend online during the school day. Unfortunately, harmful content persists on social media, including falsehoods that can lead to targeted violence. As of 2021, only two states require media literacy courses in public schools. This statistic became the impetus for the creation of How2INFORM (H2I). H2I is an initiative designed to engage middle school and high school students in fact-based research to combat the rise of dangerous images and messaging on social media. Misinformation, disinformation, malinformation, and conspiracy theories persist on social media.