All truth is relative: patterns of fake media content

We talked with the author of the article, Mariana Sargsyan, Assistant Professor of the Chair of English Philology, YSU Faculty of European Languages and Communication, who has been the head of the "British Literature and Language Culture Study" scientific group since 2017.

In 2022, Mariana Sargsyan wrote the research paper "All Truth Is Relative” Or How to Not Be Fooled in the Post-Truth Age?" to present a report at the international conference entitled "Postmodernism in Humanities" organized by the Faculty of European Languages and Communication, which was later published as a scientific article.

The author of the article mentioned that although many people are interested in the fight against fake news, the patterns and peculiarities of the language they employ, the issues related to the influence of linguistic units are not covered at a sufficient level.

The article aims to examine the linguistic component of media content, and in practical terms, to show some patterns, the knowledge of which may help to be sensitive to the published material, without being immediately susceptible to a primary emotional response that fake news is aimed to generate.

"The core of the article is the concept of cognitive approach to reading, and this is possible only in case of an analytical and critical approach to linguistic and textual units," said Mariana Sargsyan, adding that the technologies of creating fake news are constantly changing and developing.

Referring to the fake news spreads in social media, M. Sargsyan said, "Now there is an interesting pattern: the more the political and social instability, uncertainty and related anxieties increase, the more active the fake news field is and the mechanisms of creating them are improved. And language is the main tool for creating and spreading fake content. The number of English-language materials in that regard is quite large on the Internet." The results of the study of many patterns presented in the article indicate that fake news is often published on the websites of unreliable sources, low-ranking newspapers or spread through social platforms. There are also many cases when even on the websites of high-ranking daily newspapers fake content is published, which is later denied after completing the "mission".

Conducting a lot of research and studying English-language websites and information platforms, Mariana Sargsyan collected more than a hundred headlines taken from English-language newspaper websites and various information sources. The author notes that most often fake content is clearly reflected in titles.

Within the framework of the analyzed English-language materials, words with an evident emotional component and a very negative meaning, the use of words inappropriate to the language of the press, the unnecessary use of punctuation marks, as well as other professional details were singled out.

"Fake content aims to evoke an emotional response from the reader and make an immediate impact on them. In this way, one can easily control the mood of the society or form a desired opinion. Let’s take the fake news spreading during the COVID-19 pandemic as an example. Judging by the comments on social media, it had huge impact on reader’s emotional condition. Analytical and critical reading skills should be developed, paying attention to how the material is provided and what measures are used. The structure of the title can imply a lot, and the critical approach can help, "the author of the article assured.

It should be noted that Mariana Sargsyan is the author of many articles. Her articles are published on professional platforms for academic and research communities.

Get acquainted with the article "All Truth Is Relative” Or How to Not Be Fooled in the Post-Truth Age?" here.

YSU Publishing House, being aimed at contributing to the internationalization process of the university in the scientific field, is now continuously working to publish the scientific journals "Journal of Sociology", "Journal of Political Science", "Translation studies: Theory and Practice", "Armenian Folia Anglistika" in the scientific database "Scopus".