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Randomized control trial finds IREX’s media literacy messages to be effective in reducing engagement with disinformation | IREX

The Kremlin sponsored an aggressive propaganda campaign using social media to influence the 2016 U.S. elections. In an effort to determine the impact of the disinformation campaign on voters, the RAND Corporation, in partnership with IREX, conducted the first study to use a randomized control trial to understand the effect media literacy messaging could have on social media users. With short, social media–sized media literacy content, RAND tested how using various interventions and revealing the source of the content changed audience reactions.

The report, Russian Propaganda Hits Its Mark: Experimentally Testing the Impact of Russian Propaganda and Counterinterventions, utilized media literacy messages developed as part of IREX’s Learn to Discern (L2D) approach and revealed the following three important findings about the way propaganda influences audiences and the role of media literacy in countering disinformation in the United States.

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Source: Randomized control trial finds IREX’s media literacy messages to be effective in reducing engagement with disinformation | IREX