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Consuming Fake News: A Matter of Age? The Perception of Political Fake News Stories in Facebook Ads

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Human Aspects of IT for the Aged Population. Technology and Society (HCII 2020)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNISA,volume 12209))

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Abstract

Social media are increasingly being used by young and old as a source of information. Fake news is also on the rise. The role played by age in the consumption of fake news on social media, however, is unclear. This paper explores the generational differences in the consumption of fake news, first by discussing previous empirical studies in this field and then on the basis of an empirical study carried out between the beginning of February 2018 and the end of June of 2018. In that empirical study, 14 political fake news articles (e.g., relating to Brexit and Donald Trump) were disseminated in the form of advertisements on Facebook. User interaction with the fake content was tracked in order to analyze the number of users in the age groups 13–17, 18–24, 25–34, 35–44, 45–54, 55–64, 65+. The results of the empirical study show that the articles had a higher reach amongst the older age groups, as well as that many people likely took the headlines at face value without clicking on the link. The number of emotional responses posted by the pro-Brexit and pro-Trump groups was greater than those posted by the pro-remain and anti-Trump groups. All of the posts were permitted to run as advertisements on Facebook despite Facebook’s efforts to limit the spread of fake news on their platform. In the final section, conclusions are drawn, limitations described and implications for future research are outlined.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Belgian fact-checker Maarten Schenk, who created the Fake News website together with the second author of this paper, which made it possible to disseminate the fake news stories on Facebook. This paper is part of the research project BConnect@Home (https://www.jp-demographic.eu/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/BCONNECT_2017_conf2018_brochure.pdf), funded by the JTP 2017 - JPI More Years, Better Lives (Grant Agreement 363850) - the Netherlands, ZONMW (Project 9003037411).

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Utrecht University, Bijlhouwerstraat 6, 3511 ZC, Utrecht, The Netherlands

    Eugène Loos

  2. Impact Consultancy, Amsterdamsestraatweg 959A, 3555 HR, Utrecht, The Netherlands

    Jordy Nijenhuis

Authors
  1. Eugène Loos
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  2. Jordy Nijenhuis
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Eugène Loos .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Tsinghua University, Beijing, China

    Qin Gao

  2. Chongqing University, Chongqing, China

    Jia Zhou

Appendices

Appendix 1

Fake News Post on the Big Ben

Since the EU paid for the current renovation of the Big Ben tower in London some people are claiming that the tower should be moved to Brussels. The UK has voted to leave the European Union and is scheduled to depart on Friday 29 March, 2019. The UK and EU have provisionally agreed on the three “divorce” issues of how much the UK owes the EU, what happens to the Northern Ireland border and what happens to UK citizens living elsewhere in the EU and EU citizens living in the UK. Talks are now moving on to future relations, and the Big Ben tower in London could become part of those talks. 80% of the funding for the renovation of the tower is contributed by the EU and now people want their money back!

Which people, you might ask..

Well.. None!!

Because this article is Fake!

It is written to show you how easy it is to create false headlines, and how dangerous they are. Websites that post click-baity headlines often fill their pages with ads, and are making a shitload of money. These headlines often include outrageous claims which are not supported by evidence. By clicking on unfounded sensational news you contribute to the spreading of fake news. The only thing we can do is undermining their business model!

So next time you see a headline like ours? Think twice about clicking on the link!

Target Audience for Advertisement (Facebook Options)

Living in: United Kingdom

Age: 13-65+

People who match: Interests: Theresa May, Big Ben, Boris Johnson, London or UNILAD and Politics: Likely to engage with political content (conservative) or Likely to engage with political content (liberal).

Facebook Results (Some Examples)

  • Headline: ‘Big Ben to be moved to Brussels because of Brexit?!’

  • Persons reached: 11.094 persons (women: 29,3%, men: 70,7%)

  • 355 reactions (104 likes, 1 love, 226 haha, 4 wow, 20 angry)

  • 206 comments (178 on post, 28 on shares)

  • 47 shares

  • 1.515 Post clicks (redirects to website) = 13.66%.

178 Comments Directly on Post (Including Some Examples)

Read the article and got the joke: 23 (12.92%)

  • “If you read it. It says that it fake news. Made up to see how things spread on the internet.”

  • “Amazing comments on here. Does anyone actually read the full article these days? Or are you all happy just to read a headline and get angry?”

Emotional pro-Brexit: 35 (19.66%)

  • “Teresa may is giving the EU all our other assets and freedoms they may as well have this to”

  • “Might as well as the bells will be in the way of the call of prayer 5 times a day . . One they cleared out free speech”

Emotional anti-Brexit: 6 (3.37%)

  • “Can you imagine the look on brexiters faces if this had to happen? Would be comedy moment of the century.”

  • “Aww crying Brexiters really perk up my day…”

Emotional without clear affiliation: 44 (24.73%)

  • “O fuck off”

  • “Yep & take all the corrupt pigs in the troth with it, weak government, no morals all on the take, time to sort em out!”

Skeptical: 51 (28.65%)

  • “yeah sure”

  • “Sounds like April fool”

Other: 19 (10.67%)

  • Reply to friend: “With you I’m always right ”

  • “And apparently we are going to have to keep the maroon Passports as we cannot make blue ones in the UK!!!”

Appendix 2

Fake News Post on Donald Trump’s Wall

Experts claim that Donald J. Trump has to pay royalties to the Chinese government for the ‘Wall’.

President Donald Trump has set in motion his plan to build an “impenetrable, physical, tall, powerful, beautiful, southern border wall” between the US and Mexico. This border is about 1,900 miles (3,100 km) long and traverses all sorts of terrain. But what he does not know, is that the collection of fortifications known as the ‘Great Wall of China’ has exclusive rights on the term “Wall”.

In Chinese histories, the term “Long Wall(s)” appears in Sima Qian’s Records of the Grand Historian, where it referred to both the separate great walls built between and north of the Warring States and to the more unified construction of the First Emperor. The longer Chinese name “Ten-Thousand Mile Long Wall” came from Sima Qian’s description of it in the Records, though he did not name the walls as such. The ad 493 Book of Song quotes the frontier general Tan Daoji referring to “the long wall of 10,000 miles” Because of the wall’s association with the First Emperor’s supposed tyranny, the Chinese dynasties after Qin usually avoided referring to their own additions to the wall by the name “Long Wall”.

The current English name evolved from accounts of “the Chinese wall” from early modern European travelers. By the 19th century, “The Great Wall of China” had become standard in English, French, and German, although other European languages continued to refer to it as “the Chinese wall”. Since then a copyright has been imposed on Wall-like structures by the Chinese government. And now they are preparing a lawsuit against Donald Trump.

They’ll see him in court!

The court date has been set for never.. Because, this article is a lot of bogus. We wrote this article to show you how easy it is to make people believe in wild stories.. You probably clicked on this link because you thought it was funny, it made you angry or sparked your interest.

We are sorry to break it to you, but articles that are too crazy to believe, are probably not true!

Keep that in mind next time you see a headline like ours;-)

Target Audience for Advertisement (Facebook Options)

Living in: United States

Age: 13–65+

People who match: Politics: Likely to engage with political content (conservative), Likely to engage with political content (liberal) or Likely to engage with political content (moderate).

Facebook Results (Some Examples)

  • Headline: ‘Experts claim that Donald J. Trump has to pay royalties to the Chinese government for the ‘Wall’. They’ll see him in court!’

  • Persons reached: 7.500 people (women: 29.8%, men: 70,2%)

  • 355 reactions (189 likes, 11 love, 344 haha, 10 wow, 1 sad, 28 angry)

  • 118 comments (108 on post, 10 on shares)

  • 121 shares

  • 491 Post clicks (redirects to website) = 6.55%.

108 Comments Directly on the Post (Including Some Examples)

Read the article and got the joke: 13 (12.04%)

  • “Yeah. Good joke”

  • “It’s nothing Other than a humorous joke ”

Emotional pro-Trump: 22 (20.37%)

  • “Maybe we can hire Chinese labor to build the wall that Mexico is going to build.”

  • “Oh my! Liberals will try anything to make our President look bad! Give it up already!”

Emotional anti-Trump: 6 (5.56%)

  • “Good luck! He filed Bankruptcy on the million his Dad lent him. Never paid Daddy back either. His Attorneys will handle it.”

  • “Trump sucks on all levels.”

Emotional without clear affiliation: 14 (12.96%)

  • “BULLSHIT, NOTTA going to happen.”

  • “STOP YOUR BULL. CHINA DIDN’T INVENT WALLS.”

Skeptical: 48 (44.44%)

  • “Fake all the way. America doesn’t pay China for any wall. Only total idiots would believe this”

  • “I guess I will also have to pay there is a “wall” in my backyard and the one inside ”

Other: 5 (4.63%)

  • “[Tag of a friend]”

  • “[GIF]”.

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Loos, E., Nijenhuis, J. (2020). Consuming Fake News: A Matter of Age? The Perception of Political Fake News Stories in Facebook Ads. In: Gao, Q., Zhou, J. (eds) Human Aspects of IT for the Aged Population. Technology and Society. HCII 2020. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 12209. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-50232-4_6

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