Supplementary written evidence submitted by the Open University

 

Brief introduction

  1. This submission constitutes supplementary written evidence from The Open University written by Caroline Tagg and Philip Seargeant. It follows both the written evidence we submitted in December 2017 and our participation in the inquiry’s oral evidence session on 23 January 2018.
  2. As a follow-up to the oral evidence session, we would like to share with the Committee some additional observations on the role that qualitative research has to play in tackling fake news. These were briefly touched upon in the session on 23 January and here we provide more detail.
  3. These observations are made in support of one of the recommendations we made in our December 2017 written submission, namely that the Committee asks Government to:

The need for qualitative research

  1. Research is essential in understanding the spread and implications of fake news. Large scale quantitative research can usefully reveal broad patterns in people’s online behaviour by, for example, tracking the spread of rumours, as Professor Lewandowsky pointed out in his evidence. But what this type of research cannot tell us is why people act as they do. It cannot explain why people might choose to share seemingly sensationalist headlines or untrue stories. Nor can it show what impact wider patterns of online behaviour might have on individual beliefs, voting behaviours, or other contributions to social and political life. There are many questions which quantitative or statistical research leaves unanswered – questions which are key to a full understanding of the phenomenon, and the development of workable solutions. These include: Do people really believe the news they spread? Does it influence how they vote? Does it necessarily translate into what they do? In short, what do the broad trends that are revealed in the statistics actually mean in terms of their impact on society?
  2. One way to make sense of seemingly inexplicable trends such as the spread of fake news is to dismiss the people involved as acting rashly, illogically or out of ignorance. This can sometimes seem to be the most plausible explanation. The problem with this assumption, however, is that it risks both legitimising and exacerbating the very issue we are trying to address, that of political polarisation. When we stereotype people who we do not know as lacking good sense or rational thinking, our actions contribute to the ‘us and them’ framework which increasingly characterises political debate in the era of social media. It is analogous to the use of ‘fake news’ as a way of denouncing stories with which we disagree.
  3. What such assumptions overlook is the myriad of personal, social and ideological factors which shape people’s online behaviour, and the complex ways in which these factors can come together to determine what any one individual might decide to do at any one given time. As we noted in our initial written evidence, social media is, as the name indicates, a social phenomenon, and the decisions people take about their interaction on it are closely tied up with the relationships they have with the people they are interacting with. To take a fairly straightforward example, one of our interviewees told us that he kept his Facebook profile public, which we initially took to imply that he did not care about privacy (a charge that is often made by adults in relation to teenagers’ use of social media). When we asked him about this however, he explained that ‘I do that intentionally because it helps me to see it for what it is ... it essentially forces me not to put anything too private on Facebook’ (see Taking Offence on Social Media, link below). His reasoning in this case led him to carry out an action which felt counter-intuitive to us but made perfect sense in the light of this explanation. His response also highlighted the often unexpected ways in which people exploit the functionalities of Facebook in ways that work for them given the type of interactions that the site makes possible.

The meaning of ‘fake’ news

  1. How does this argument relate more directly to fake news? As noted above, in our earlier evidence we pointed more generally to the importance of social relationships and self-presentation on Facebook, and it is not difficult to imagine situations in which the wish to bond, or maintain a particular relationship with a close friend, employer or family member might take precedence over careful consideration of the veracity of a story.
  2. But it is also important to consider what ‘veracity’ means in this situation. Does it mean that something has been carefully fact-checked, or that it hits home in its emotional impact, or that it upholds what an individual believes to be an important and justifiable worldview? The term ‘fake news’ has evolved over the past two years to refer to a wide range of different phenomena, while also being employed as part of a rhetorical strategy to undermine the legitimacy of other people’s opinions. As the linguist George Lakoff says, there exists both ‘real fake news’ and ‘fake fake news’. What this points to is that any investigation of the impact that fake news is having on society needs also to explore the ways in which political discourse is becoming increasingly partisan, and the role that the current media landscape has played in effecting this. 
  3. In order to address the problem of fake news (as well as the related issue of political partisanship) we need to understand the motivations and contexts behind people’s decisions to share – or denounce – online posts. This can only be done through in-depth, qualitative research which draws on interview and observational data in seeking to understand how the people involved make sense of the situation and how their ideas shape their behaviour, both online and offline. In many ways, the discourse about fake news – i.e. media opinions of what it is, what causes it, and the impact it is likely having on society – has run ahead of the actual data we have about the phenomenon. For any sustainable solutions to be found it is important first to ensure we understand in detail what that issue is and what is causing it. This is why we feel it is important that the government facilitate qualitative research into people’s social lives online and how this shapes their engagement with online news.

Reference

Tagg, C., Seargeant, P. and Brown, A. A. (2017) Taking Offence on Social Media London: Palgrave. Available: https://www.palgrave.com/gb/book/9783319567167

 

February 2018