Perceptions about fake news in Portuguese higher education students: An analysis of consumption and attitudes

Fake news constitutes a significant part of one of the most complex problems that affect the flows of information in contemporary society: disinformation. Although this is not a recent phenomenon, the political and social consequences of the spreading of fake news on the internet have been thoroughly discussed in the last couple of years. Currently young people are the group with greater exposition to this reality due to the prevalence of communication technologies in their daily lives. On this article we review the literature on disinformation and analyse the longstanding relationship between false news and journalism, focusing on the particularities of the present situation. Using quantitative methodology, we conducted a survey to analyse the perceptions regarding fake news of 602 students (17-25 years-old) from higher education in Portugal. Our findings reveal a group that is clearly used to getting information online and has already contacted with fake news. However, different conceptions about what is fake news coexist, including erroneous ones. Hence, this study reaffirms the importance of media and information literacies, particularly the importance of raising awareness on credibility assessment, fact checking and the particularities of the information flows.