Truth or consequence : A study of young adults' news consumption and source-critical thinking

The increased pace and sensationalism in news journalism during the digitalization has made terms like fake news and clickbait more popular and a concern has emerged that future generations will live in a world where truth is a fluid concept. Our study aims to investigate the sources from which young adults receive news and their source-critical thinking about that information. To examine this, we performed a quantitative survey, 104 respondents in the age of 18 to 25 participated and answered 41 questions. The results gathered during 2 weeks because of the time-frame of our study. This study addresses differences in young adults’ trust in various news sources, what variables may affect it and how critical they are to information in their newsfeed. The focus is on how young adults actively influence their news flow and how this affects their trust in it, as well as which variables affect trust in news, linked to who conveys it and the recipient’s level of education. The results show that young adults who actively search for news and influence their news flow have a bigger trust for the news that they are taking part of. It also shows that trust in news is linked to the educational level of the recipient’s and their perception that the news source which is distributing the information are seen as not angled and impartial