The Fake News Educational Materials Fellowship was initially conceived with the intention of researching fake news, misinformation, and disinformation within journalism in a range of areas: the psychological and socio-economic causes of the creation and circulation of fake news; data literacy and determining credibility; and bias in news reporting, analysis, and selection.
For our research, “journalism” consisted of (1) traditional print news media; (2) digital traditional news media that is hosted on an established site or circulated by the host organization on social media sites; (3) digital news media that is more independent, consists of commentary or an aggregation of content from previously published news sources in some way, or contains newly created information; and (4) other print or digital media that may utilize statistics or facts in some way, but cannot be inherently conceived of as news.
The end result of our research was initially to update the course ALA 270: Fake News, Lies, and Propaganda: How to Sort Fact From Fiction taught by Jo Angela Oehrli, as well as to provide information to supplement the University of Michigan’s Library’s fake news guide of the same title.
After we decided on this deliverable, we made a timeline on which to work towards it. As it was October by the time we finalized administrative details, we needed the rest of the fall semester to plan our course of action and work with other research librarians to ascertain the best research methods to use. Our research advisor, Jo Angela Oehrli, suggested several resources for us to utilize throughout November.
Because we decided on using Zotero to organize our research, we first met with User Services Librarian Harold Tuckett to learn how to make the most out of the platform. Then, we learned more about library instruction by sitting in on classes taught by Student Engagement Librarian Amanda Peters and our own advisor, Learning Librarian Jo Angela Oehrli. In the latter class, we were privy to dialogue from Knight Wallace Fellows, such as Orlando de Guzman, which helped to shape the topics that we later decided to research in the following semester. Finally, through a tour of the library and meetings with the Director of the Social Sciences and Clark Library Shevon Desai and Education Librarian Dr. Karen Downing, we felt like we had a good enough basis to start our research in the winter semester.
After finalizing our research methods, we began to fine tune the topics that we would find articles for and discuss each week. Over eleven weeks, we explored twenty-four topics related to our initial conception of what the fellowship’s scope would be. Along the way, there were innumerable shifts in the way we thought about the conclusions we derived from our discussions.
In January, for instance, we discussed local journalism several times, including topics like its commodification in an era dominated by social media, the public good it can promote, and the power structures imbued in it — especially in regard to how they give or take voice from marginalized groups. A highlight of our conversations from February was the extent to which the rise in Tiktok’s prominence is altering the spread of misinformation and disinformation, and how this phenomenon is lessening the importance of previously established methods to lessen the spread of it. And throughout the project, the topic of coded bias in social media algorithms and AI technology continuously appeared. The extent to which we discussed these topics, and how they successively shaped our conversations was not anticipated at the beginning of the project, but was crucial to shaping the information that we wanted to include in our fake news guide.
Developments in current events similarly shaped our conversations, as during the course of our research the artificial intelligence platform ChatGPT rose to prominence among students on our campus, there was critical coverage of Microsoft’s rollout of AI-based Bing search engine feature, and Twitter underwent a series of changes following its purchase by Elon Musk.
Looking ahead, while we have made significant progress in accomplishing the goals of our research project, there is still a lot of work to be done. Throughout the rest of April, and into part of May, we will continue meeting with our advisor, Jo Angela Oehrli, to discuss revisions and supplements to the content of her course — ALA270: Fake News, Lies, and Misinformation: How to Sort Fact from Fiction — and develop a Google website to link to the University of Michigan Library’s current fake news guide.
As the ALA270 course has already been perfected, the course alterations will likely center around updating some course materials to reflect the changing nature of the dissemination of misinformation and disinformation, as well as finding examples of the proliferation of fake news that have occurred in recent months. Similarly, because of the breadth that the University of Michigan Library’s current fake news guide offers, our supplemental Google site guide will focus on fake news as it relates to novel social media platforms and aspects of the propagation of misinformation and disinformation that relate to people with marginalized identities.
Overall, this fellowship opportunity not only gave us the opportunity to work towards deliverables that we are passionate about, but also allowed us to explore personal interests related to the ways bias informs narrative framing in the recounting of a news story, and how this informs public reaction, policy formation, and the results of these two things impacting each other. The research we have conducted will aid us in further understanding the tactics behind news collection and presentation and provide us with a better analysis of socio-political events.
We would like to thank the entire University of Michigan Library team, but especially our advisor, Jo Angela Oehrli, for the fantastic research experience we have had this semester. It has not only been resoundingly impactful to work on a project that has such clear implications for the future of our democracy, but also to learn how to become better stewards of the value of truth. We hope that future students will continue to do similar research on the topic as new formats of misinformation and disinformation arise, and that there continues to be confidence in our collective ability to surmount the monumental obstacles that are posed by them.
Michael Hartt has just finished his second year at the Ross School of Business.
Shauna-Kay Harrison is just finishing her first year as a Masters student in UMSI