Teens, Social Media, and Fake News

This chapter proposes a user perspective approach, to unravel how teens receive and perceive fake news on social media. It introduces and contributes to recent studies that analyze how young people interact with news and fake news, to better understand their diverse perceptions of the phenomenon and their related practices. Building on journalism and audience studies, the chapter identifies three key research foci to help identify essential factors that shape how teens deal with fake news on social media. These factors include: negotiation, navigation, and personalization. The chapter presents the main outcomes by examining teens’ interactions with fake news. Teens spontaneously offered numerous and detailed examples to explain how they interacted with fake news. Teens are also attentive to the origin of the content disseminated on social media. The chapter draws upon insights gained from our research to sketch ways of addressing disinformation among teens.