Fake news was widely cited as a problem during the 2016 US election, but a new analysis suggests that, at least in that country, it may not affect public opinion as much as has been suggested.
Duncan Watts at the University of Pennsylvania and his colleagues analysed the daily media consumption habits of people in the US and found that deliberately false or misleading content makes up only a tiny fraction of what people watch or read.
Watts and his colleagues found that, on average, people consumed fake news for 0.15 per cent of the total time they spent watching TV and movies or gaming, using social media and enjoying other such entertainment.
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Source: There probably isn’t as much fake news in the media as we think | New Scientist