KAMLOOPS — If you’ve been paying attention to American politics over the past year, It’s unlikely you haven’t heard the term ‘fake news.’
Fake news is defined as a deliberate spread of misinformation.
Try as Trump may to convince the American people of misleading reports, TRU professor Charles Hays says fake news is actually very rare.
“There isn’t really much out there in the way of ‘fake’ information,” says Hays. “Think about it, if you’re going to create information that’s going to look like it’s true, but it’s not, that’s a relatively sophisticated thing.”
Hays has been teaching journalism at TRU for 13 years.
He says it isn’t ‘fake news’ that’s challenging today’s students, it’s finding a credible source.
“There’s been an explosion of opportunity for anyone to get their words out to a much broader audience,” says Hays. “That means even more now, we need to ask those questions of ‘how do we analyze that in terms of its correctness, in terms of its believability’?
At the TRU Library, staff say their brains and time are being stretched by students from all departments.
“It’s easy for them to find information with electronic resources like Google etc, what’s hard for students if determining good information,” said Brenda Mathenia, University Librarian at TRU.
Hays advice to students who may be drowning in information overload is to research their sources.
“The classic tips we still use today apply such as ‘Who said it? Who are they connected to? Are they being funded by somebody with a specific agenda? Everybody wants a ‘best way’ but unfortunately there isn’t a silver question you can use that will detect a hidden ideological agenda, so you have to look at a lot of things,” added Hayes.
Another thing Hays says today’s internet users must do is avoid ‘confirmation bias’ where a person automatically believes what someone is telling them, just because they agree.
Instead, he recommends browsing articles of opposing views in order to seek the best credible source.
And then, there’s always good old fashioned hardcopy books.
