Ithaca College

Assistant Professor of Journalism Anthony Adornato published a paper, Forces at the Gate: Social Media’s Influence on Editorial and Production Decisions in Local TV Newsrooms, in the Electronic News journal. The study reveals that the reliance on social media content has increased the chances that newsrooms will spread misinformation. A third of respondents indicated their stations have reported information from social media that was later found to be false or inaccurate. Despite this, policy has not caught up with practice. One of the more striking findings of this study is, of those newsrooms that have social media policies, nearly 40% said the policy does not include procedures for verifying social media content before it is included in a newscast.  Read the study here.