Fake news & mental health
In certain situations, especially crisis and panic situations, we are all susceptible to believing fake news, but the participants believe that susceptibility to fake news decreases if a person’s education is higher.
Fake news leads to a change of opinion and the formation of a certain attitude, which often results in polarization and the creation of social divisions.
With media consumption rising and availability of media being more spread, the internet has become the main source of information. In the past, we have searched for true and correct information in traditional media, today, more increasingly young people and children are receiving the main information through social media.
This is an issue, as for some people it’s hard to distinguish which information is authentic and true. The social media channels don’t have editorial boards (like in traditional media) to make selection of news and make a factual check of information before they are published.
Therefore, social media has become a significant source of disinformation, or fake news. When talking about fake news, the Cambridge Dictionary (2023) defines it as “false stories that appear to be news, spread on the internet or using other media, usually created to influence political views or as a joke.”
The reasons why fake news is created
Financial reasons
People creating fake news are getting financial profit through clicks on their websites or their views on social media help them gain credibility, so they can put ads later which could be sold.
Political reasons
Usually, the fake news is created to discredit the political candidate during the elections, or when someone tries to influence the public opinion on the topic.
Social reasons
Creating fake news helps to gather people together, on social media, or even beyond; for example, different groups believing conspiration theories could create their own groups.
Psychological reasons
Usually it is connected with having a status in the society or asking for validation from other people
For fun
Sometimes, fake news are created to share funny stories or to create satire; in the media world, there are several portals that are satiric in nature, so sometimes their stories could be interpreted as true.
Fake news has an impact on health in general. The best example how fake news can be harmful and create issues within societies was shown with the COVID-19 pandemic which happened from 2020 until 2023. Research showed that the false information on the origin of virus has shaped the individual use of preventive measures. People who believed that the virus was created by the pharma industry have used hand sanitizers and face masks less, but also they had lower numbers of vaccinations. (Romer and Jamieson 2020, Maertens et al. 2020).
It must be emphasized that fake news also affects the people and citizens greatly, as they are not understanding the real source. People who have been exposed to correct and incorrect information will through time decrease their level of confidence in sources of information that are reliable and trustworthy. (Ecker et al. 2022).
Based on all the above, we have decided to create a non-formal programme “Impact of fake news on mental health”, which aims to increase critical thinking for young people and learn how to analyse the content available on portals and social media. Transversal skills which young people acquired during the training will help them to understand fake news and what is the impact on their mental health.