Today we live an epidemic of fake news or half-truths (half-news), misinformation is on the agenda and we don’t know what news to believe and which not to believe, but the reason is not that people want to read false information and that, as a result, demand has increased. People want real information, especially if it fits their beliefs. Still, the consumption of fake news has increased significantly.
To understand this phenomenon, we must move on to the psychology of motivation, in addition to having a conscious desire to obtain real information, we have other unconscious motivations that lead us to try (at least) to confirm our beliefs. In this way, messages that satisfy these motivations will be accepted as true, even when they are false (the opposite may also happen).
- One of the motivations we talk about is the need for cognitive closure.
- Which relates to uncertainty.
- When this need is activated.
- People are attracted by simplistic messages that affirm absolute truths.
- As if that were not enough.
- We all have this need for to a greater or lesser extent.
- Even situations that involve disorder and generate uncertainty can increase the need to solve this problem.
An example of a simplistic message is given by the news that immigrants are responsible for all the social problems we have, this message is simplistic because it divides the world between good and bad, we are good and immigrants are bad. a “scapegoat” of our problems, giving us a cause, or rather a cause. Therefore, simplistic messages are more likely to be believed and accepted without too much control.
Similarly, messages that claim a specific result, whether false or true, can be easily accepted if they are consistent with what people want to believe, yet we will not believe anything simply because we think the same way.
When fake news is very outrageous, such as the fact that Barack Obama was a member of the Ku Klux Klan, and contradicts what we know or think is reasonable, they are more likely to be rejected, even if this fake news can satisfy our motivation for specific results.
Despite the fact that it is seen, lack of knowledge can make the most outlandish news accepted as true. Several studies have shown that the most educated and elderly (linked to more experience) are less vulnerable to fake news. In fact, they have more resources, in terms of critical capacity, when it comes to classifying a news story as false or true.
In these cases where disrecognise predominates, we generally rely on people we consider specialists, when a car breaks down we call a trusted mechanic, when you get sick go to a doctor you trust.
In the past, for most news and information issues about society, politics and the world, we have used respectable social institutions, such as a government agency, a congressional representative, the country’s president, or media sources. the media lost control of the reliability of the citizens and had the great confidence of the majority.
But these times have changed and neither the government nor the media enjoys the confidence of yesteryear. The recent crisis and corruption have helped us to trust them less and less. Faced with this mistrust in the “traditional” media, people are looking for other means of information that satisfy the motivation to close their specific doubts and results.
The advancement of the Internet and its rise in power have also contributed to distrust of experts and the rise of fake news. The moment of confusion in which we live, characterized by rapid changes and growing unrest (e. g. the rise and growth of Asian powers such as China and India, Islamic terrorism, economic instability, the refugee crisis, etc. ). ) has led us to look for up-to-date information, we want to know what’s new as they happen.
This demand, coupled with the gap created by mistrust of traditional sources of information, has opened the door to new sources of information, especially on the Internet and social media, which are often motivated by new sources, over which there is little or no control or tempted to change people’s political opinions in the desired direction , that is, manipulate.
Whatever the remedy, the current scourge of misinformation worries, demands and justifies an effort on the part of the social institutions involved in restoring their tarnished credibility.