If you have no memories of what the world was like the internet like, you are certainly part of the famous “Gen Z”: the generation born between the late 1990s and the early 2010s. You may have already been qualified as “digital children”, as comfortable online as Ill (for older: “in real life”, “in real life”). No doubt, you know how to handle the digital tool like no other generation before you.
However, contrary to what one could naturally think, the American media political reports that the Gen Z is also the most gullible generation in the face of false information. It seems that having grown up with social networks does not protect fake news and does not particularly forge critical sense, quite the contrary.
A study conducted in the United States By researchers from the University of Stanford in California in 2021 analyzed the ability of high school students to identify a fake news. The team of scientists showed a video at 3,446 of them, representing images of urns jam in a polling station, with the mention “Electoral fraud during the 2016 democratic primaries filmed!”. These were actually images shot in Russia that a simple research on Google could have traced quickly. However, only three high school students managed to make the link with Russia.
“There is a myth that some people, having grown up with digital devices, would be well equipped to understand the information they provideexplains Joel Breakstone, who led the study. These results are disturbing. “ Unfortunately, other studies confirm that the generation born with the Internet is most incapable of discerning the true of the false in the information gleaned online.
Distrust is not a mother of security
To explain this phenomenon, it must first be remembered that a large part of the young generations is more information on social networks than on traditional media. This can lead to a vicious circle: they are increasingly skeptical of institutions and more inclined to conspiracy theories, which pushes them to flee the traditional media and to immerse themselves in restricted online communities, which then water them with lies based on powerful algorithms and which further strengthen their distrust.
As for the verification of information, it would also seem that the young generation has a particularly doubtful technique: to look at the comments section. Only, in the era of all-powerful algorithm, comments are often resonance funds of people who share the same ideas and the same point of view on the subject, whatever its relevance.
“The algorithm helps to separate people in a way that deeply concerns meexplains Daniel Cox, sounder and director of the Survey Center on American Life. We do not share the same online experiences, we have very distinct experiences, different according to our gender, our sexual orientation or our political opinions. Anything you experience can find a form of online validation. ” These effects of algorithm partly explain why generation Z is particularly permeable to conspiracy theories.
For his part, Rakoen Maertens, specialist in behavioral sciences at the University of Oxford, explains that generation Z is particularly vulnerable to disinformation compared to older groups, not only because of its habits on social networks but also because it has less lived experiences and knowledge to discern reality. He claims, however, that even if generation Z is today more likely to fall into the Fake News trap, there is hope that over time, it becomes more able to detect them, just like the generations that preceded it.
