Large-Scale Digital Media Literacy Interventions for Older Adults
Recent research has identified older adults as a population especially likely to be exposed to and engage with misinformation online. This is particularly worrisome given that older individuals are significantly more likely to turn out to vote compared to other age groups. Unfortunately, existing interventions aimed at helping people sort fact from fiction online have often overlooked this key demographic. The goal of Getting Wise to Fake News is to offer an efficient solution to this problem. In partnership with MediaWise, a non-profit journalism organization, our team plans to develop, rigorously evaluate, refine, and ultimately scale a digital media literacy intervention that is explicitly tailored to the unique needs and strengths of older individuals. Because older adults are especially civic-minded and tend to have more discretionary time, bolstering their digital media literacy could help them emerge as important assets in society’s fight against misinformation.
