Do people demand fact-checked news? Evidence from US Democrats

In: Chopra, Felix, Haaland, Ingar and Roth, Christopher (2022). Do people demand fact-checked news? Evidence from US Democrats. J. Public Econ., 205. LAUSANNE: ELSEVIER SCIENCE SA. ISSN 0047-2727

Abstract

In a large-scale online experiment with U.S. Democrats, we examine how the demand for a newsletter about an economic relief plan changes when the newsletter content is fact-checked. We first document an overall muted demand for fact-checking when the newsletter features stories from an ideologically aligned source, even though fact-checking increases the perceived accuracy of the newsletter. The aver-age impact of fact-checking masks substantial heterogeneity by ideology: fact-checking reduces demand among Democrats with strong ideological views and increases demand among ideologically moderate Democrats. Furthermore, fact-checking increases demand among all Democrats when the newsletter fea-tures stories from an ideologically non-aligned source. (c) 2021 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.