UC EVENTS

Dear Colleagues,

Please join us for a FAD Research Seminar Series hosted by the N&MRC.

Date: Monday 2 August 2021

Time: 1:30pm-2:30pm

Location: 1A21 & Zoom

Zoom Details for those unable to attend in person:

https://zoom.us/j/98349518394?pwd=VlRQNllrTmxBdENCRWtGOTNxTmk3dz09

Meeting ID: 983 4951 8394 
Passcode: 818270

Presenter

Dr Kieran McGuinness

Title

COVID Contradictions: Trust, misinformation and audience perceptions of news and information in a hybrid media environment

Abstract

At the height of the pandemic trust in news about COVID-19 and levels of news access soared in Australia, but less than a year on those levels of trust and access have not been maintained. Concern about misinformation is widespread, but reported experience is less so, with almost one-in-four (23%) saying they didn’t know if they had come across misinformation in the past week. Only 18% of Australians say they trust news on social media, but over half (52%) still use social for news and a growing proportion say it is their main source of news. These and other seemingly confounding findings demonstrate the difficulty of understanding audience perceptions in a hybrid media system. However, rather than dismissing what cannot be easily explained I argue these gaps point the way towards new, and potentially more profound research targets. This presentation brings together findings from three research projects, including the ongoing Digital News Report: Australia series, a survey of Australians perceptions of news and misinformation conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic, and a recently published content analysis of news media reporting of COVID-19 during 2020. Using these three studies I will discuss the complexity of defining and understanding risk and harm associated with misinformation in a hybrid media system, and propose avenues for future research.

Biography

Kieran McGuinness is the Digital News Report Postdoctoral Fellow at the News & Media Research Centre at the University of Canberra. His recent research focuses on mixed method approaches to news consumption, misinformation, journalistic role performance, and defence journalism.