Who is Most Susceptible to False or Misleading News?

Oh Generation Z, how could you fall for that fake news story? Don’t get too proud, those of you who self-identify as “extremely conservative”—you may want to do a little extra fact checking, too. But people in Finland? Thanks for being a beacon shining light on truth!

Let’s back up. You might have been exposed to data from this study before. Researchers at Cambridge University developed the Misinformation Susceptibility Test (MIST) in 2023. Since YouGov did the first big push to get study participants and published the results from the first 1,500 U.S. responses, tens of thousands of people around the world have gone through the list of headlines to assess their ability to spot real news from misinformation. (You can take the quiz yourself.)

Now armed with more than 66,000 responses, researchers just published a study drawing conclusions based on the demographic data collected in the survey, which covers gender, education, location, and political ideology.

The survey also cruelly asked participants to rate how well they think they can spot misinformation, so as we dig into their findings we can throw some praise to Gen Z as well: Sure, you’re the worst at being able to spot the fake headlines in the MIST, but at least you own it. The researchers note that Gen Z participants were less confident in their ability to recognize misinformation than other generations.

Which generation is tops? Bless those brooding, skeptical Gen Xers (described with affection since this author is one of you!), they scored best. And okay Boomers, I hear you, you were very close. Here’s the breakdown (all tables show average correct identifications out of 20 headlines in the MIST):

Taking a look at the table, you might wonder if those differences really matter at all—a fair question. One thing to remember is the research is based on a huge dataset—12,270 from Gen Z and 26,807 Millennials, for example—which means even small deviations are statistically valid.

Here’s how the researchers described it: “Although the observed effect sizes of the current study may not seem large at first glance… given how much time most people spend on the Internet, how much misinformation circulates online, how easily it spreads, and how consequential it may be—from decisions regarding vaccinations to decisions at the ballot box—the real-world impact of these differences may be non-trivial.”

Here's a look at other results by demographic, keeping in mind a couple of notes. First, several groups had relatively low numbers of participants: “non-binary/third” gender category had 4,325, and high school or less education had 5,583. Second, this is magnified when considering political ideology. Far more liberal people took the survey than conservatives: A total of 9,669 choose the middle ground of moderate, 52,082 chose one of the three liberals options, and 4,491 chose one of the three conservative options, which includes only 245 who self-identified as “extremely conservative.”

Geographic comparisons come with an even bigger caveat: the MIST is an English-only survey, and even beyond the language barrier, the researchers note it is hard to know how different cultural approaches to the subjects in the list of headlines might factor into geographic differences. Still, for your edification, of those countries that had at least 250 respondents, here are top and bottom five in terms of being able to identify the misinformation in the Cambridge study.

Why does any of this matter? The researchers sum up: “Misinformation poses a serious threat to the functioning of societies worldwide. Given the grave real-world consequences of misinformation, it is crucial that we have a better understanding of who is most at risk of misinformation to combat this problem at both the societal and individual levels.”

Security Management has several good resources on misinformation, including these:

• Learn about the SIFT Model in a Fast Facts video on getting better at identifying fakes, frauds, and misinformation.
• Learn about “The Proliferation of Dangerous Untruths” from ASIS’s own Teresa Anderson.
• Learn out artificial intelligence is making it even harder for those hoping not to be fooled, and why that’s ominous for security.

Author's note: I will keep my political leanings to myself, but in true male, American, graduate degree fashion, I scored 19 out of 20 on the MIST. It took a minute of Googling to determine which one I got wrong—I have no problem outing myself about the one I missed, but I don’t want to give away any spoilers.