Truth Decay: How News And Information Has Changed In The Digital Age

By Steve Goldstein
Published: Friday, May 17, 2019 - 1:43pm
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As cable news outlets have cemented themselves more in the national consciousness, and online sources of information have become more popular than traditional newspapers in many places, it’s increasingly difficult to find unbiased news. And some would say that more people actually want to find reporting and commentary that they agree with, as opposed to objectivity.

The RAND Corporation just released the second part of a report under the umbrella of “Truth Decay.” It’s called "News in a Digital Age: Comparing the Presentation of News Information Over Time and Across Media Platforms."

The initial report, released last year, looked at the diminishing role that facts, data and analysis are playing in political and civil discourse. The new one tries to quantify how news has changed over the past couple of decades by studying millions of words from 15 different outlets.

Jennifer Kavanagh, senior political scientist at RAND, joined The Show to talk about the report.

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