You Can’t Handle the Lies!: Exploring the Role of Gamson Hypothesis in Explaining Third-Person Perceptions of Being Fooled by Fake News and Fake News Sharing

Abstract

This study examined the third-person perception (TPP) in terms of the influence of fake news through the lens of the Gamson hypothesis – the combination of political trust and political self-efficacy – and how the perception may affect one’s fake news sharing behavior. Data from a national survey (N = 1,024) indicates that Dissidents (low political trust, high political self-efficacy) who are likely to perceive greater exposure to fake news are likely to exhibit stronger TPP of fake news effects than the other Gamson groups. We also found a negative association between TPP and fake news sharing, suggesting that Dissidents who are likely to have stronger TPP are less likely to share fake news than non-Dissidents. Implications for the current political landscape are discussed.

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Magdalena Saldaña and Bitt Moon for their helpful suggestions. We would also like to thank Dr. Mike Schmierbach, Dr. Patrick Meirick, and the two anonymous reviewers for their thoughtful feedback during the review process.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed on the publisher’s website.

Notes

¹ Egelhofer and Lecheler (2019) point out that fake news has two-dimensions: a genre (similar to the narrow definition of fake news) and a label (the political weaponization of the term to delegitimize news media). As this study focuses on the fake news as a genre, we did not address fake news as a label.

² Online Appendix A presents the demographic characteristics of the U.S. population and this study’s demographic. This study’s sample mirrors the demographics observed in the 2016 Pew Research Center survey.

³ The mean difference between the scores for oneself and others was significant, t(1,025) = 27.74, p < .001..

⁴ Even if it is not necessary for testing hypotheses, regression analyses with four different models with each group as a reference group and one-way ANCOVAs were also conducted to make pairwise comparisons. See Online Appendix C for details.

⁵ Before testing the hypotheses, we first conducted a series of paired-samples t-tests to identify the presence of TPP in each Gamson group. All the Gamson groups perceived others would be more affected by fake news than themselves (Assured: t(295) = 12.83, p < .001; Dissident: t(211) = 14.91, p < .001; Subordinate: t(299) = 15.61, p < .001; Alienated: t(215) = 12.86, p < .001).

⁶ Alternative serial multiple mediation models using Assureds, Subordinates, and Alienateds as a reference group, respectively, were tested (see Online Appendix E). The results using the alternative models were almost identical to the results presented here..

⁷ We conducted alternative analyses to isolate the independent contribution of self-efficacy, political trust, and the interaction term between these two to TPP. Here again, political trust (B = −.26, SE = .11, p = .02) negatively related to TPP whereas self-efficacy (B = .10, SE = .04, p = .03) positively did. The interaction term was not significant, which suggests a non-linear relationship between the interaction (self-efficacy x political trust) and TPP. See Online Appendix D for more details.

Additional information

Funding

This paper is a project of the Digital Media Research Program at the University of Texas at Austin. It received partial funding from the Center for Media Engagement at the Moody College of Communication, University of Texas at Austin, as well as the university’s Graduate School.

Notes on contributors

Taeyoung Lee

Taeyoung Lee (M.A., Indiana University) is a Ph.D. candidate in the School of Journalism and Media at The University of Texas at Austin.

Thomas J. Johnson

Thomas J. Johnson (Ph.D., University of Washington) is the Amon G. Carter Jr. Centennial Professor in the School of Journalism and Media at The University of Texas at Austin.

Heloisa Sturm Wilkerson

Heloisa Sturm Wilkerson (Ph.D., University of Texas at Austin) is an assistant professor in the Department of Communication at Purdue University Fort Wayne.