Fake news on Social Media: the Impact on Society

Femi Olan*, Uchitha Jayawickrama, Emmanuel Arakpogun, Jana Suklan, Shaofeng Liu

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

30 Citations (Scopus)
25 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

Fake news (FN) on social media (SM) rose to prominence in 2016 during the United States of America presidential election, leading people to question science, true news (TN), and societal norms. FN is increasingly affecting societal values, changing opinions on critical issues and topics as well as redefining facts, truths, and beliefs. To understand the degree to which FN has changed society and the meaning of FN, this study proposes a novel conceptual framework derived from the literature on FN, SM, and societal acceptance theory. The conceptual framework is developed into a meta-framework that analyzes survey data from 356 respondents. This study explored fuzzy set-theoretic comparative analysis; the outcomes of this research suggest that societies are split on differentiating TN from FN. The results also show splits in societal values. Overall, this study provides a new perspective on how FN on SM is disintegrating societies and replacing TN with FN.
Original languageEnglish
Number of pages16
JournalInformation Systems Frontiers
Early online date19 Jan 2022
DOIs
Publication statusE-pub ahead of print - 19 Jan 2022

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