Archive for July, 2015

Don’t simply trust claims made in authoritative media tones — even if, perhaps especially if, journalists work for the most influential media outlets — unless they point to evidence that confirms or at least suggests their truth.

Source: A Crucial Realization About Journalism is Learned by Being its Subject

Source: Dallas Morning News buyout eliminates many of paper’s most familiar names

This is something I found as a professional on both sides of reporting. People trust media reports about things they know nothing about, but often are highly critical of reports about things they do know about, signaling that journalists don’t always do a good job of understanding information and communicating that information to a lay audience.

What’s most surprising is that, despite these failures, smart people still tend to trust journalists on the things they don’t know about.

Source: Miscommunication of science: music cognition research in the popular press