Information Literacy

Fake News and Information Literacy

This guide provides information about the important topic of Fake News and Information in today's society.

While the amount of fake news these days seems to continue to grow, some may find it harder and harder to decipher what is true and what is not. As seen in the 2016 Presidential election, this lack of information literacy can have a real-world impact. This guide is intended to provide you with resources you can use to help you evaluate sources, whether it's potential fake news or a source for a research paper.

What is information literacy?

According to the Association of College and Research Libraries, "Information literacy is the set of integrated abilities encompassing the reflective discovery of information, the understanding of how information is produced and valued, and the use of information in creating new knowledge and participating ethically in communities of learning." Essentially, this means that information literacy can be seen as how well we do with understanding and evaluating different types of sources, including the news, and how effectively we use that information.

How can information literacy help?

By improving your information literacy skills, you will be better equipped to identify fake news, as well as potential bias in regular news. This will help you be not only a smarter consumer of news, but hopefully a more informed citizen as well. These skills are applicable beyond reading news and will also come in handy when evaluating sources for your research.

This guide can help you learn more about information literacy, provides tools to help you evaluate news sources, and lists many other fact-checking resources.