The credibility of social media and ethical implications for young people

Abstract

Introduction: social networks are scenarios overload with information, tutorial, recommendations, jokes, advertising, fake news, and other contents which do not always reach the desired quality standards in mass media. Learning to handle this environment is essential to maintain critical and informed citizens, particularly among the youngest. This research focuses on the opinion about the content that circulates on social networks and the credibility and trust generated. Methodology: a correlational study is run with 935 participants between 18 and 25 years old selected by snowball process that filled an online questionnaire. Exploratory factor analysis identifies four dimensions that assess the implications of social media. Results and Discussion: those who are more identified with the controversial vision and lack of objectivity of social media show a higher level of trust in the sources of information on the Internet and lower trust levels in the news that appears in the profile feed. Sharing the vision of social media as an alternative channel to be informed is associated with giving greater confidence to the news content of social media, to the recommendations of unknown users and influencers. Conclusions: young people have a vision of the implication of social media that reflects some of the problems that have arisen in this space of interaction. The recommendation is to maintain a critical attitude towards social media content.