This briefing explores the impact fact checkers’ work can have on public figures, institutions and the media.
There are numerous studies of the effect of fact checking on public figures and the media, and the circumstances under which it is or isn’t effective. For this briefing, we identified 15 studies relevant to this topic which provide a mixture of empirical and anecdotal evidence.
These show:
There are examples worldwide both of politicians responding positively to fact checking (by correcting themselves in public, by no longer using claims shown to be inaccurate, or better still by seeking out reliable evidence first, before making claims) and of politicians continuing to repeat falsehoods.
The one peer-reviewed experiment on the impact of fact checking on politicians to date found that alerting politicians in the US to the threat of fact checking could encourage them to make fewer inaccurate claims. Other research by a PhD student in the US found evidence of fewer false claims being made after publication of a fact check.
Fact checking can, according to these studies, have an impact on some politicians’ behaviour, but we need to better understand the circumstances that make this most effective and how to make it a durable effect.
Some media outlets use fact checking content in their work, and journalists have reported changing their practices in terms of the way they question sources on grounds of accuracy. But there is still a long way to go to raise awareness of the practice and more to understand about how fact checking might encourage journalists to take on the principles of the practice in their own work.
We did not come across any research looking at the impact of fact checking on institutions, but we cover some examples of this in case studies.
Africa Check, Chequeado and Full Fact are working together to look at how we can gather more evidence on this topic in the coming years.