Content on Facebook : sensationalism and accuracy verification challenges

• Main Author: Yu, Valerie Jingwen
• Other Authors: Sin Sei Ching, Joanna
• Format: Theses and Dissertations
• Language: English
• Published: 2018
• Subjects: DRNTU::Library and information science::Knowledge management
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10356/75948
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

This study explores user perceptions of sensationalism and the associated accuracy verification challenges on Facebook. With the increasing prevalence and rapid transmission of sensationalism on social media, it is important to understand how users perceive such news stories, and what can be done to help improve their news browsing experience on social media channels. An analysis of Facebook user perceptions towards sensationalism revealed that individuals did not necessarily disagree with the use of all forms of clickbait, however, all types of fake news were deemed unacceptable. Favourable preconceived source credibility also appeared to have an effect on an individual's ability to positively identify clickbait from the respective source. It was also apparent that there are gaps in individual news accuracy verification activities that could be improved with the help of automated tools.