Browsing by Author "Frau-Meigs, Divina"

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Fighting disinformation: Evidence for policy making
(Routledge, 2024) Corbu, Nicoleta; Frau-Meigs, Divina; Teyssou, Denis; Bârgăoanu, Alina
In recent years, “fake news” has become a buzzword, often weaponised for various purposes. A very abundant literature addressing many facets of the phenomenon has flourished in the last years covering topics related to definitions and classifications of “fake news”, its negative effects, and the technological facilitators associated with it, etc. However, literature focusing on ordinary people’s understanding of “fake news” is rather scarce. By means of two focus groups (N = 8) conducted in four countries (France, Romania, Spain, and Sweden), one with teachers and one with ordinary people (N = 64), we investigated the audience’s perspectives on “fake news” definitions, possible effects, and potential measures to address them. Findings show that there is an almost general consensus about strategic intentions as key to defining “fake news”. The perceived impact of “fake news” is very high among participants, with concern about democratic consequences, especially in the public health sector. Finally, differences between the two types of groups and across countries are further discussed, with a focus on implications for evidence-based policymaking.
Teachers’ views on disinformation and media literacy supported by a tool designed for professional fact-checkers: perspectives from France, Romania, Spain and Sweden
(2022-09) Nygren, Thomas; Frau-Meigs, Divina; Corbu, Nicoleta; Santovena-Casal, Sonia
The current media eco-system has become more and more polluted by the various avatars of “fake news”. This buzz term has been widely used by academics, experts, teachers and ordinary people, in an attempt to understand and address the phenomenon of information disorder in the new media environment. However, studies have rarely questioned what teachers, key stakeholders in the media literacy field, actually understand by “fake news”, and to what extent the new digital tools available to fact-check are actually viable solutions to fight disinformation actively. In this context, we conducted focus groups (N = 34 people interviewed in 4 focus groups) with teachers in four countries (France, Romania, Spain and Sweden), in order to assess their understanding of “fake news”, as well as their perception of possible measures to combat the phenomenon, with a particular focus on digital tools. The findings show that the understanding of the concept of “fake news” differs from one country to the other, but also within the same country, with a common feature across countries: intention to deceive. Additionally, respondents identified lack of media and information literacy (MIL) in education as a major gap for combatting information disorders. Furthermore, they find that the use of digital tool for professional fact-checking needs to be repurposed or followed by pedagogical instructions to fit into the complexity of educational practices. Our findings highlight possible solutions for MIL in education using a combination of technocognition and transliteracy as theoretical framework and scaffolded pedagogical design for better adoption of fact-checking techniques.