Bias and Media Literacy

Bias and MEdia

How We Interact with and Understand the World Around Us

Media Literacy

#0120

What is Media Literacy?

Analyze, Evaluate, Act

To practice media literacy means to be able to critically analyze a piece of media and determine its accuracy and credibility.

Why Should You Practice Media Literacy? We've already actually talked about it before, but you should practice media literacy so that you are critical thinkers and informed members of society. Whether you believe so or not, you actually do have to be critical of all the media you're consuming. And I'm doubling down on this point because it directly relates to identifying bias in media.

You've Already Started Doing This!

Recognizing the rhetorical situation can be used to help determine the credibility and purpose of a piece of media.

A Brief Video

Introduction to Media Literacy? -Crash Course

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What is Bias?

"Objectivity is Impossible"

Bias is generally understood as a prejudice against one group, thing, or person. Normally, we associate bias with disliking or being against one person, group or thing—but we can also be biased for a person, group or thing. Bias tells us what we tend to agree with or disagree with. Everyone has bias, it’s not something we can completely eradicate, but it is something we should watch out for because not understanding our own biases or failing to see the biases in others narrows our perspective and can negatively impact the way we interact with others.

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Types of Bias

Confirmation Bias

Searching for and interpreting new evidence to fit a belief or opinion you already have.

Unconcious (Implicit) Bias

Social stereotypes about groups of people that individuals form outside of their conscious awareness. This is the most common type of bias.

Dunning-Kruger Effect

When someone overestimates their knowledge of a subject. Their misplaced confidence can lead to misinformation being spread

Anchoring Bias

Relying too much on the first piece of information you come across when researching.

Media Bias and How to Identify It

Like your own personal biases, media biases are unavoidable. Although news reporters and journalists should be objective, it is impossible to achieve true objectivity because every person has their own biases. So, the writers creating the news stories have biases that influence how the news organization chooses to talk about an event or topic. Sometimes this is done without intention. Reporters and journalists are trying for objectivity, but their own opinions and experiences influence the way they relay information. Other times, media is biased on purpose because they are trying to reach or instigate a specific audience. For instance, some news organizations are specifically intending to speak to a conservative audience, while others speak specifically to a liberal audience. Some speak to highly educated people, and some speak to school age children. The kind of audience a person or organization intends to speak to will inform the way they write, which leads to either explicit (purposeful) or implicit (unconscious) bias.

Inflammatory Language

How headlines, articles, ads, and videos get you to click

Much of the media we consume uses inflammatory language whether you realize it or not. Inflammatory language is language that is used specifically to get a rise out of the audience—usually appealing to the audience's curiosity, fear, anger, or hatred. Inflammatory language is used purposefully to get a reader's attention and to instigate them into clicking on an article or link. You’re all probably very familiar with this concept in the form of clickbait. Things like YouTube videos or shady tabloids rely on clickbait. It usually looks something like this: “I PRANKED MY GIRLFRIEND AND YOU WON’T BELIEVE WHAT SHE DID NEXT” Not only is the headline in all caps, drawing the viewer's attention to it, but the creator is also insinuating that something shocking will happen in the video. In all actuality, the video won’t be shocking. The girlfriend probably had a normal reaction to being pranked, but the overexaggeration in the title appeals to an audience’s curiosity.

Bias and Inflammatory Language

We can start to identify an article's bias by considering the inflammatory language it uses.In combination with the CRAAP test (currency, relevancy, accuracy, authority, Purpose) from CMAC, this video will break down how to analyze language and the authors logic building for evidence of bias.

“Biden admin hires czar to monitor school book ban: 'Threat' to students”

"Concerned parents across the country have been clashing with school districts over controversial books"

"The Biden administration finally named a coordinator to combat book bans. That was the easy part.”

Match the Excerpt to the Article

Review the two excerpts from news articles below and match them to the headlines we just dissected.

#1: "According to the American Library Association, which will be hosting the session, attendees will learn how the Education Department enforces federal civil rights laws Links to an external site., including how the law applies to libraries, how "book bans" might violate civil rights laws, and how to submit complaints about potential violations.Nosanchuk's appointment comes just days after a contentious Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on so-called "book bans" that went viral after Sen. John Kennedy, R.-La., grilled a college activist over whether parents should have a say in what books are available in public libraries."

#2: "The announcement came amid months of tough talk from Biden and Education Secretary Miguel Cardona over the so-called parents’ rights movement, a conservative-led campaign that largely targets school policies that promote diversity and equity or inclusion of the LGBTQ+ community. Those efforts often include calls to restrict student access to books, many of which have LGBTQ+ or racial themes and some of which include sexual material."

Hawaii poised to slap tourists with $25 climate tax: ‘Small price to pay to preserve paradise'

Headed to Hawaii on vacation? Tourists may need to pay a climate tax. Here's what to know

Match the Excerpt to the Article

Review the two excerpts from news articles below and match them to the headlines we just dissected.

#1: "If Hawaii Gov. Josh Green has his way, your next vacation to the Aloha State will cost an extra $25.​Lawmakers are calling for action to address the damaging environmental impact of tourism, particularly in the wake of the devastating wildfires in Lahaina, Maui, which killed 100 people and is projected to cost $6 billion to rebuild.​ The proposed bill aims to impose a $25 climate tax on tourists in order to protect Hawaii's natural resources from an influx of visitors. With 9.5 million tourists visiting the state last year, according to the state, concerns about the strain on the environment have become increasingly urgent."

#2: Lawmakers in Hawaii are poised to approve a $25 climate tax on tourists who visit the Aloha State in an effort to combat what they claim is an assault on the area’s natural resources.​The state, which saw 9.5 million people visit last year, is recovering from the devastating wildfires in Lahaina, Maui, which killed at least 100 people and caused damages worth around $6 billion.​ The proposed tax will pay to protect beaches and prevent wildfires, state officials said.​ “It’s a very small price to pay to preserve paradise,” Hawaii Gov. Josh Green, a Democrat, told The Wall Street Journal.

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What is the difference between media bias and propaganda?

Propaganda is the wide spreading of information or ideas to either help (as in presidential election ads) or harm (as in Nazi antisemitic propaganda) a group, nation, movement, etc. Propaganda seeks to influence our emotions, opinions, and actions. For this reason, all propaganda is persuasive. Pieces of propaganda do not always persuade us in the most overt ways, often they use very subtle tactics to convince their audiences. Propaganda is biased, as all things are, and they want to persuade you into sharing their bias.

Reading Response #7

By yourself or with a group, whichever you prefer, go on the website All Sides and find an article about any topic you'd like. Then, find an article about the same topic, but from a different perspective. Once you have your articles, begin comparing and contrasting them. What differences do you notice in how the information is presented? What is the rhetorical situation (audience, purpose, tone, context)? Where do the authors use ethos, pathos, and logos? Do the articles include visuals such as graphs or pictures? What genre conventions do you notice? Does one article use more inflammatory language than the other? Where do you see the author showing their bias in each article? This should only be a page or two. You can upload either separately or together. If only one of you uploads the assignment, please make sure you have everyone's name on the page so I can grade accordingly.

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For instance, if someone likes apples more than bananas, they are biased towards apples and biased against bananas. There’s nothing wrong with liking apples more than bananas, but when giving recommendations for baked goods, a person who doesn’t like bananas is probably not going to recommend recipes involving bananas, but they probably will recommend recipes involving apples. For a more serious example that you might have experience with, think about the political parties in America. If someone considers themselves a Republican, they tend to agree with more “conservative” or “right wing” thinking and ideologies—that is their bias. If someone considers themselves a Democrat, they tend to agree with more “liberal” or “left wing” thinking and ideologies—that is their bias. One isn’t necessarily right or wrong in this instance—it simply means they prefer one political party's policies over the others—but having that bias also means they are less likely to read or engage with things from the other side that they don’t agree with. That is the core issue of bias. Not engaging meaningfully with things you don’t agree with can narrow your perspective and stunt your critical thinking development, making it harder for you to understand or sympathize with people or ideas you have a bias against.

WWII Propaganda

How was this image used as propaganda? What was the purpose of this image? What is its ethos, pathos, and logos? What is the tone? What is the message being sent? Who is the audience? What is the creator of this poster's bias? How do you know? Questioning bias is just as essential in visual rhetoric as it is written rhetoric.