All the President’s Tweets: Effects of Exposure to Trump’s “Fake News” Accusations on Perceptions of Journalists, News Stories, and Issue Evaluation

Abstract

The label “fake news” was used in 2016 to describe disinformation messages disseminated during the 2016 US Presidential campaign, particularly such messages on social media sites, but the term was quickly co-opted by President Donald Trump and his administration for use as a general epithet to discredit journalistic coverage critical of the White House. Across two preregistered experimental designs, we empirically examine the effect that President Trump’s tweets containing “fake news” accusations toward journalists have on how audiences perceive news stories. Our first study showed no direct effect of exposure to “fake news” tweets on outcomes. In our second study, we found users who read more fake news tweets rated a story about Hurricane Maria victims and its author as more credible, showed greater transportation into the story, experienced higher levels of meaningful affect, indicated more favorable views toward providing more aid to Puerto Ricans, and had greater intentions to consume more news in the future.

Notes

¹ After accessing the survey, participants filled out basic demographic information (age, sex, and race) and controls (political ideology, DACA stance, political cynicism, skepticism, and external political efficacy). Then, participants were exposed to one of the experimental conditions and then provided responses on the outcome variables. Originally, 405 MTurk participants accessed the survey, but we removed participants who spent less than 30 s or more than 240 s with the stimulus. We retained 331 participants or 81.73% of the full sample. Participant age ranged from 18 to 80 years (M = 24.48, SD = 13.77) and was 66.5% female.

² A single participant left the cynicism, skepticism, and intentions to read news in the future scales blank but had completed the other items.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Daniel J. Tamul

Daniel J. Tamul (Ph.D., The Pennsylvania State University, 2011) is an assistant professor in the Department of Communication at Virginia Tech. His research interests include advocacy communication and studying how formal features of narratives influence persuasive outcomes.

Adrienne Holz Ivory

Adrienne Holz Ivory (Ph.D., Virginia Tech, 2010) is an associate professor in the Department of Communication at Virginia Tech. Her research interests include the psychological and social influences of media on health-related attitudes and behaviors.

Jessica Hotter

Jessica Hotter (M.A., Virginia Tech, 2018) is the Associate Director of Licensing and Trademarks for Virginia Tech. Her research interests include the ways in which media images influence body image. She oversees the protection and enforcement of the Virginia Tech brand.

Jordan Wolf

Jordan Wolf (M.A., Virginia Tech, 2018) is currently a Business Analyst at EAB in Richmond, Virginia. His research interests include how trace data can be used to supplement public opinion polling.