Thread by @Sacha_Altay

Here is a thread with some key facts about fake news that we presented with @berriche_manon at the Festival of Science:

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Fake news are consumed by a minority of internet users (whether it’s on Twitter or Facebook) and are shared by an even smaller minority (0.1%).

Sources:
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30679368
advances.sciencemag.org/content/5/1/ea…
papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cf…
science.sciencemag.org/content/363/64…
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We are pretty good at detecting fake news and distinguishing unreliable sources from established sources such as The New York Times.

Sources:
papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cf…
sciencedirect.com/science/articl…
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Contrary to the so-called discourse about the deregulation of the information market, more established news websites receive way more attention than “fake news” websites.

Sources:
press.is/static/files/f…
institutmontaigne.org/ressources/pdf…
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There is very little scientific evidence that fake news influenced major events such as Brexit or the election of Donald Trump.

Sources:
pubs.aeaweb.org/doi/pdfplus/10…
oxfordscholarship.com/view/10.1093/o…
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Bonus: Echo chambers are more prevalent in offline social networks than online, where we are more likely to encounter information we disagree with. And internet usage is negatively correlated with polarization.

Sources:
researchgate.net/profile/Benjam…
pnas.org/content/114/40…
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