Don’t Believe Everything You Read

1. Don’t Believe Everything You Read By: Meredith Perry, Strider Stokes, Britt Stringfellow

2. Introduction • We were interested in learning about UNC students’ perceptions of the war in Iraq and fear of terrorism through manipulation of source credibility and tone of the article. • Research Question: For college students, controlling for gender, favorite newspaper, and time spent reading newspapers, we wanted to find what the relationship is between source credibility / tone of article and attitudes towards article??

3. Literature Review • Based on Gerbner’s Cultivation Theory, Mean World Index, and Priming • Questionnaires based on prior cultivation research by Koomen, Visser, and Stapel who did a study on credibility of newspapers and fear of crime

4. Hypothesis • Based on prior research, we thought that those participants exposed to pessimistic articles would have a more negative attitude towards that article as well as the world around them. • We also hypothesized that the credibility of the source would be a strong factor in determining people’s attitudes towards that article.

5. Method • 2 x 2 experiment with four conditions measuring the correlation between source credibility and tone. • Four Conditions: Optimistic from credible source (New York Times), Optimistic from non-credible source (Globe), Pessimistic from credible source (New York Times), and Pessimistic from non-credible source (Globe).

6. Method • Created two different articles • Manipulated to look like they came from New York Times or Globe • Gave each participant an article to read first and then completed a questionnaire • Distributed questionnaire to 80 people, 20 for each condition • Questionnaire had 35 questions

7. Method • Measuring people’s attitudes towards the article, the news source, as well as fears of terrorism on a 7 point scale.

8. Results The results were p < .05, which is statistically significant. For attitudes towards article, tone was more important than credibility.

9. Results The results were p < .10, which is marginally significant. When the article was pessimistic people had more negative feelings about society. We suspect that the negative tone of article primed the participants to have a more negative view of the world around them.

10. Results The results were p < .10, which is marginally significant. Those who were exposed to the pessimistic article were more worried about terrorism.

11. Results These results tell us that how people feel about the news source is directly related to tone of article.

12. Results Very significant results. Credibility is directly related to attitudes of quality.

13. Discussion • Tone is very influential on people’s perceptions of the quality of that article, which leads to positive or negative attitudes towards article. • Overall newspaper quality ratings were higher when newspaper is credible. Also higher when tone is optimistic. • Another interesting finding is that women had a higher fear of becoming a victim of terrorism than men. Female mean = 3.01 Male mean = 1.65

14. Discussion In relation to the hypothesis, most of our initial perceptions were correct. Participants exposed to pessimistic articles were more likely to fear terrorism, have a more negative view of the world around them, and have a more negative attitude towards news source and article.

15. Practical Implications • Since we found that the pessimistic article resulted in a lower overall quality rating towards the news source, we recommend that newspapers should avoid printing pessimistic articles.

16. Limitations • As we were developing the questionnaire, the war essentially ended so our stories were not pertinent. • Some participants questioned validity of the articles because of their exposure to accurate news information. • Some participants had not heard of the Globe and did not realize it was a tabloid magazine.

17. Suggestions for Future • Use sources people are more familiar with. • Distribute surveys within the same time frame so people would not question the validity.