SUBSCRIBE
SUBSCRIBE
EXPLORE +
  • About infoDOCKET
  • Academic Libraries on LJ
  • Research on LJ
  • News on LJ
  • Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Libraries
    • Academic Libraries
    • Government Libraries
    • National Libraries
    • Public Libraries
  • Companies (Publishers/Vendors)
    • EBSCO
    • Elsevier
    • Ex Libris
    • Frontiers
    • Gale
    • PLOS
    • Scholastic
  • New Resources
    • Dashboards
    • Data Files
    • Digital Collections
    • Digital Preservation
    • Interactive Tools
    • Maps
    • Other
    • Podcasts
    • Productivity
  • New Research
    • Conference Presentations
    • Journal Articles
    • Lecture
    • New Issue
    • Reports
  • Topics
    • Archives & Special Collections
    • Associations & Organizations
    • Awards
    • Funding
    • Interviews
    • Jobs
    • Management & Leadership
    • News
    • Patrons & Users
    • Preservation
    • Profiles
    • Publishing
    • Roundup
    • Scholarly Communications
      • Open Access

July 11, 2019 by Gary Price

New Report from RAND: “Exploring Media Literacy Education as a Tool for Mitigating Truth Decay”

July 11, 2019 by Gary Price

From RAND:

Truth Decay — the diminishing role that facts, data, and analysis play in political and civil discourse — appears to result, in part, from an increasingly complex information ecosystem. Technology, in particular, offers continual access to information of varying quality and credibility, information that can blur the line between fact-based evidence and opinion. Not everyone is equipped with the skills necessary to navigate such uncertain terrain.

The purpose of this report is to describe the field of media literacy (ML) education and the ways in which ML education can counter Truth Decay by changing how participants consume, create, and share information.

One limitation of this research base arises from the variety of ways that literature defines and measures ML outcomes; while a multiplicity of viewpoints can be beneficial, it also presents challenges in terms of aggregating findings across studies. Despite this, the authors describe existing evidence that ML could be a useful tool for combating Truth Decay. They also provide an inventory of ML offerings available to the public.Finally, the authors make suggestions for moving forward, with the specific recommendation that professionals in ML and related fields strengthen their communication and collaboration, considering where there are opportunities for a common approach to researching ML. The authors recommend that policymakers and practitioners increase participation from diverse constituencies in scaling ML efforts.

Key Findings

The term media literacy can refer to many different fields and competencies

  • ML encompasses a variety of interrelated disciplines, such as information literacy, news literacy, digital literacy, science literacy, visual literacy, and others.
  • ML is traditionally defined as a set of specific competencies: the abilities to access, analyze, evaluate, and communicate media messages in a variety of forms. However, the ways that these competencies are framed varies across fields.

Past research suggests ML can influence information consumption and creation behaviors, but causal evaluative research is lacking

  • Studies that have been conducted vary widely in how they have defined and measured ML competencies. This makes it difficult to aggregate across studies over time.
  • Past research has identified some evidence that ML increases participant resiliency to disinformation and is able to change the way participants consume, create, and share information. However, there is little causal, evaluative research in the ML field that isolates the effects of ML interventions.
  • More research needs to be done to identify measures that best assess complex ML competencies and how, when, and what types of ML education are most effective.

ML Resources are Comprehensive and Varied

  • An online appendix to this report contains a list of ML interventions, curricula, and other resources focused specifically on news literacy and information literacy.
  • This database is intended to provide a centralized location for information about such resources and give interested stakeholders a means for comparing them across multiple dimensions.
  • Currently available programs are diverse in terms of format, delivery method, and audience.

Recommendations

  • Researchers in ML and related fields should strengthen interdisciplinary communication and collaboration.
  • Policymakers and practitioners should increase participation from diverse constituencies in scaling ML effort

Direct to Complete Summary

Direct to Full Text Report
163 pages; PDF. ||| Read Report Online

Direct to Data File (.zip/.xls)

Direct to Truth Decay Project Website

Filed under: Data Files, News

SHARE:

About Gary Price

Gary Price (gprice@mediasourceinc.com) is a librarian, writer, consultant, and frequent conference speaker based in the Washington D.C. metro area. Before launching INFOdocket, Price and Shirl Kennedy were the founders and senior editors at ResourceShelf and DocuTicker for 10 years. From 2006-2009 he was Director of Online Information Services at Ask.com, and is currently a contributing editor at Search Engine Land.

ADVERTISEMENT

Archives

Job Zone

ADVERTISEMENT

Recent Articles on LJ

Dartmouth Repatriates Samson Occom Papers to Mohegan Tribe

How Ted Lasso Changed My Librarianship | Backtalk

Tour de France: A Watching, Reading, and Listening Guide | Your Home Librarian

On Critical Cataloging: Q&A with Treshani Perera | Equity

From the Top: Library Leaders Talk EDI | Equity

ADVERTISEMENT

Related Infodocket Posts

State of New York Releases First-Of-Its Kind Statewide Address-Level Broadband Map

From GCN: An address-level, interactive broadband map will help officials in New York explore statewide high-speed internet availability, assess connectivity needs and better allocate state and federal funding. The map ...

Journal Article: "Rarely Analyzed: The Relationship Between Digital and Physical Rare Books Collections"

The article linked below was recently published by Information Technology and Libraries. Title Rarely Analyzed: The Relationship Between Digital and Physical Rare Books Collections Authors Allison McCormack University of Utah ...

Charles Watkinson Takes Office as AUPresses President

From an AUPresses Announcement: Charles Watkinson, director of the University of Michigan Press, has stepped into the presidency of the Association of University Presses. Watkinson, who also serves as associate ...

New Data From Plan S: "Transformative Journals: Analysis of Year 1 (2021)"

From a Plan S Post: The Transformative Journal (TJ) model is one of the strategies cOAlition S endorses to help subscription publishers transition to full and immediate Open Access (OA). ...

New From Delta Think: "Publishers and Market Consolidation–Part 1 of 2"

From a Delta Think Post by Dan Pollock This month we present the first part of some results of big data analysis of the scholarly publishing industry. We look at ...

Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and STM Publish Research Report on Paper Mills

From a Committee on Publication Ethics Blog Post: COPE and STM undertook a study with Maverick Publishing Services, using data from publishers, to understand the scale of the problem of ...

5G to Top One Billion Subscriptions in 2022 and 4.4 Billion in 2027 According to Latest Ericsson Mobility...

From Ericsson: North America is forecast to lead the world in 5G subscription penetration in the next five years with nine-of-every-ten subscriptions in the region expected to be 5G in ...

"New Partners, New Projects and a New Nonprofit: RoRI Embarks on Its Next Five Years of Research on...

From the Research on Research Institute (RoRI): Today marks the start of RoRI’s Phase 2. With our international consortium of partners, we’re excited to launch another five years of generating, ...

Journal Article (Preprint): "OpenCitations, An Open E-Infrastructure to Foster Maximum Reuse of Citation Data"

The article linked below (preprint) was recently submitted for publication in the International Journal of Digital Curation (IJDC). Title OpenCitations, An Open E-Infrastructure to Foster Maximum Reuse of Citation Data ...

Canadian Research Knowledge Network (CRKN) Launches Perpetual Access Rights Tracking Project

From the Canadian Research Knowledge Network: CRKN’s Knowledge Base Entitlements Sub-Committee (KBESC) is pleased to announce the launch of the Perpetual Access Rights Tracking Project. This project allows CRKN members ...

New Data: "Nature Index Annual Tables 2022: China's Research Spending Pays Off"

From a Nature Article: Chinese research outputs enjoyed something of a boom last year. The performance of Jiangsu University is a good example. Its campus sits on the banks of ...

Brooks Rainwater is the New President and CEO of the Urban Libraries Council

Here’s the Full Text of an Announcement by ULC Board Chair, Mary J. Wardell-Ghirarduzzi: On behalf of the ULC Executive Board, I am very pleased to announce Mr. Brooks Rainwater ...

ADVERTISEMENT

FOLLOW INFODOCKET ON TWITTER

Tweets by @infodocket

ADVERTISEMENT

This coverage is free for all visitors. Your support makes this possible.

This coverage is free for all visitors. Your support makes this possible.

Primary Sidebar

  • News
  • Reviews+
  • Technology
  • Programs+
  • Design
  • Leadership
  • People
  • COVID-19
  • Advocacy
  • Opinion
  • INFOdocket
  • Job Zone

Reviews+

  • Booklists
  • Prepub Alert
  • Book Pulse
  • Media
  • Readers' Advisory
  • Self-Published Books
  • Review Submissions
  • Review for LJ

Awards

  • Library of the Year
  • Librarian of the Year
  • Movers & Shakers 2022
  • Paralibrarian of the Year
  • Best Small Library
  • Marketer of the Year
  • All Awards Guidelines
  • Community Impact Prize

Resources

  • LJ Index/Star Libraries
  • Research
  • White Papers / Case Studies

Events & PD

  • Online Courses
  • In-Person Events
  • Virtual Events
  • Webcasts
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Advertise
  • Subscribe
  • Media Inquiries
  • Newsletter Sign Up
  • Submit Features/News
  • Data Privacy
  • Terms of Use
  • Terms of Sale
  • FAQs
  • Careers at MSI


© 2022 Library Journal. All rights reserved.


© 2022 Library Journal. All rights reserved.