The good news about news consumption during the 2020 election is that fewer Americans were exposed to "untrustworthy websites" — misinformation — compared with the 2016 election, according to a recently released study by Stanford researchers published in the journal Nature Human Behavior.
That conclusion may seem surprising, given the incentives for bad actors to disseminate misinformation and the technological advancements allowing their lies to metastasize. But it also shows that increased awareness and concerted efforts by institutions and individuals to promote and seek credible information can make a difference.
"I am optimistic that the majority of the population is increasingly resilient to misinformation on the web," Jeff Hancock, the founding director of the Stanford Social Media Lab and the report's lead author, told the New York Times. "We're getting better and better at distinguishing really problematic, bad, harmful information from what's reliable or entertainment."
