UC Irvine

Mis- and disinformation are rampant issues in our world today which has led to a huge increase in the number of studies researching the topic and its potential solutions. One area that has received attention is how to evaluate media sources and often times, how to evaluate bias in media. Despite past research largely not deciding a joint understanding of this phrase, it has persisted in the research field and in teaching practices. This dissertation had two primary goals: 1) better understand the power that perceptions of bias have on our ability to evaluate information 2) utilize three different methodologies that could replace the term bias in favor of more concrete and identifiable practices and criteria. Study 1 examines the power that perceptions have and specifically the relationship between source perceptions and epistemology. Studies 2 and 3 utilize agenda setting, framing and sentiment analyses to compare various media types to online partisan media. Findings from these studies have strong implications on the research field and how to better teach evaluation of media in today’s highly dynamic informational spaces.