The Long Defeat
Can science journalism help win the battle against fake news?
Hi there! This is TITLE-ABS-KEY(“science journalism“), a newsletter about science journalism research. In the previous issue, I read an interview about journalism research and tried to figure out why this section has been getting more and more frustrating to write.
This week, I picked up a paper that hits all the right keywords post-2020 and promises “good practices” instead of a chronicle of failures. Hopefully, since science journalists do know a thing or two about fighting disinformation, this will not be the usual bummer for me. Onwards!
Today’s paper: Martin-Neira, Juan Ignacio; Trillo-Domínguez, Magdalena; & Olvera -Lobo, María Dolores. (2023). Science journalism against disinformation: decalogue of good practices in the digital and transmedia environment. ICONO14. Scientific Journal of Communication and Emerging Technologies, 21(1). DOI: 10.7195/ri14.v21i1.1949.
Why: Very eager to read about things that work.
Abstract: In parallel to the impact of the Covid health pandemic, the fight against disinformation1 has become one of the main concerns of democratic societies and the media system itself due to its historical role as guarantor of the right to access to rigorous, contrasted, and quality information. The viralization of hoaxes, most of them through social networks, has led media and journalists to place verification processes as one of the cornerstones of their activity and to explore new narratives and publication strategies to reach audiences. In particular, the younger generations are increasingly disconnected from traditional communication environments. This context is revitalizing, redefining and placing science journalism in a strategic position: for what it implies in fact-checking processes and for the opportunity to improve engagement with the public. This research is structured on the basis of a solid corpus of interviews with academic and professional experts. The considerations and opinions of these specialists have made possible the elaboration of a decalogue of good practices oriented to the exploration of the transmedia ecosystem as a vehicle for innovation and promotion of media literacy.
Well, this is all music to my ears, naturally, but I’d like to see one idea expressed more clearly: the reason why media and journalists are looking for new publication strategies is plainly because it is damn near impossible, futile really, to compete with viral disinformation on social networks. The old saying about a lie, the truth and how fast they travel (ironically often misattributed to various famous people) does not point out that the problem isn’t the truth being ‘slow,‘ boring or necessarily inconvenient. It’s that lies have evolved to be extremely fast. In the case of disinformation, you could even say they have been bred to spread virally, without the pesky ethical limitations or the burden of fact checking — and with the best available big data and knowledge on how to perfect them just for this purpose. You essentially cannot beat disinformation at what it does best in any kind of fair ‘fight,’ so it’s time to adjust the rules and look for other strategies.
In the introduction, the study evokes the ‘infodemic’ concept from the WHO; while I still appreciate the viral spread analogy, once again I have come to think it misses the very intentional nature of disinformation (to be fair, the WHO itself does mention deliberate actions but I’m fairly sure audiences who just see the word don’t see this beneath the ‘natural disaster, what are you gonna do’ connotations.)
Science journalism, understood as the discipline specializing in communicating and making the latest science content understandable for the public and in which the use of social networks and the digital environment is fundamental for the effective communication thereof, is playing a central role in the public media agenda of modern-day society precisely because of its relevance for combating misinformation. Let’s say for now I’m willing to accept this narrow understanding of science journalism, even though I think it contributes to the reductionist and pointless framing of ‘latest science content’ competing against mis- and disinformation. Even the best explained ‘science content,’ presented in some Shakespeare-meets-Star-Wars-level compelling package, is still shackled by accuracy and ethics, and rightly so — while disinfo, increasingly shaped by data-driven and proprietary insights into human behavior, is not.
Considering the social duty of the profession, the responsibility to inform, educate and disseminate scientific knowledge and, all things considered, the importance of science for human life, it is imperative that strategies be developed that help to tackle the misinformation that is consumed via digital and analogue spaces. In this way it is made easier for society to acquire mechanisms that permit it to distinguish the lies or hoaxes that are generated, contributing towards the cultivation of scientific literacy on the part of citizens. Alright, alright, I don’t want to get stuck running loops in this framing exercise, so I’ll move on to the mechanisms and strategies. There’s one more valuable thought in the introductory remarks, though: when it comes to disinformation, some media outlets clearly chose the if you can't beat them, join them option.
Although social networks provide advantages for produced content to be distributed generally free of charge, quickly and to a mass audience, the current media environment has favored the proliferation of this type of misinformative action, becoming fertile ground for the circulation of such fake content, strengthening its reach through the power of viralization held by social networks <…> Generally speaking, the media are considered as responsible for educating their audiences on news consumption and providing citizens with the ability to inform themselves appropriately about what is happening around them. In this day and age, however, the media tend to prioritize immediacy over rigorous and contrasted work, putting their role as content filterers and educators of citizens with critical thinking to one side.
I’d say that is why trying to beat fake news at their own game is not just pointless but also potentially dangerous: the temptation to get rid of the shackles of ethics and accuracy I mentioned above is too strong, and the problem is snowballing.
One example of the new disruptive channels and innovating narratives to combat misinformation that journalism has sought out is not that new: news games with a pinch of transmedia, intended to educate against disinformation or show common verification techniques. To find more examples, the authors interviewed 22 experts on science journalism in Spain, both researchers and practitioners.
Looking at an analysis of the responses, I’m glad to see them also cautioning against leaning too much into competitive territory with viral headlines and trying to ‘speed up‘ science to fit better into the news timeline. Furthermore, it’s heartening to see the answers acknowledge that solving the disinformation problem solely by ‘upgrading’ journalism is outright impossible. It’s a society-wide effort, which includes not only disinterested users who are not motivated to invest in their own media literacy, but also systems that actively benefit from illiteracy and prevent those who might be motivated from making that investment.
I was, however, surprised to see interviewees blaming social media and tech companies for not helping — and then, some of them apparently in the same breath, putting their faith into artificial intelligence and “good bots“ counteracting misinfo and disinfo on social media. Um, are you sure about that?
The transmedia portion of the response analysis tells me one thing that I must confess I can sort of relate to: most people, be it researchers or practitioners, are not always 100% sure what transmedia approaches even are. (And Apple’s spellcheck doesn’t know the word either.)
Ultimately the authors build a guide for ‘best science journalism practices in the digital and transmedia realm,’ with some recommendations for users (Figure 3 in the paper). I’d say it’s all solid and reasonable advice that is, sadly, only good for fighting the long defeat, i.e. doing what you must and hoping that enough of you choose to do the same for your side somehow to prevail. Yet, at least for a bit, Tolkien’s characters were able to reframe their fight after all: the war against Sauron was not won on the battlefield.
In their conclusions, the authors hint at the tantalizing possibility that, as the pandemic exacerbated the mis- and disinformation crisis, the media may have received a wake-up call for recovering credibility and reconnecting with audiences, and someone will figure out how to flip the script. I’m not at all sure this will be done thanks to AI or other tech; after all, it’s not the kind of reconnecting one can do with cables.
That’s it! If you enjoyed this issue, let me know. If you also have opinions or would like to suggest a paper for me to read in one of the next issues, you can leave a comment or just respond to the email.
Cheers! 👩🔬