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Fake News as We Feel It: Perception and Conceptualization of the Term “Fake News” in the Media

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Social Informatics (SocInfo 2018)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNISA,volume 11185))

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Abstract

In this article, we quantitatively analyze how the term “fake news” is being shaped in news media in recent years. We study the perception and the conceptualization of this term in the traditional media using eight years of data collected from news outlets based in 20 countries. Our results not only corroborate previous indications of a high increase in the usage of the expression “fake news”, but also show contextual changes around this expression after the United States presidential election of 2016. Among other results, we found changes in the related vocabulary, in the mentioned entities, in the surrounding topics and in the contextual polarity around the term “fake news”, suggesting that this expression underwent a change in perception and conceptualization after 2016. These outcomes expand the understandings on the usage of the term “fake news”, helping to comprehend and more accurately characterize this relevant social phenomenon linked to misinformation and manipulation.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    https://trends.google.com/trends/.

  2. 2.

    https://github.com/Ejhfast/empath-client.

  3. 3.

    http://sentistrength.wlv.ac.uk/.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Computer Science, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais (UFMG), Belo Horizonte, Brazil

    Evandro Cunha, Gabriel Magno, Josemar Caetano, Douglas Teixeira & Virgilio Almeida

  2. Leiden University Centre for Linguistics (LUCL), Leiden, The Netherlands

    Evandro Cunha

  3. Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society, Harvard University, Cambridge, USA

    Virgilio Almeida

Authors
  1. Evandro Cunha
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  2. Gabriel Magno
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  3. Josemar Caetano
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  4. Douglas Teixeira
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  5. Virgilio Almeida
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Evandro Cunha .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Koblenz, Koblenz, Germany

    Steffen Staab

  2. National Research University Higher School of Economics, St. Petersburg, Russia

    Olessia Koltsova

  3. National Research University Higher School of Economics, Moscow, Russia

    Dmitry I. Ignatov

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Cunha, E., Magno, G., Caetano, J., Teixeira, D., Almeida, V. (2018). Fake News as We Feel It: Perception and Conceptualization of the Term “Fake News” in the Media. In: Staab, S., Koltsova, O., Ignatov, D. (eds) Social Informatics. SocInfo 2018. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 11185. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-01129-1_10

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-01129-1_10

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-01128-4

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-01129-1

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

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