#12154. Social Media Help Me Distinguish between Truth and Lies’: News Consumption in the Polarised and Low-trust Media Landscape of Greece

July 2026publication date
Proposal available till 24-05-2025
4 total number of authors per manuscript0 $

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Journal’s subject area:
Sociology and Political Science;
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Abstract:
How do citizens in countries with weak institutions and highly disrupted media landscapes navigate news? We examine a typical South European case, Greece, via cross-national data sets. Combining data from a pool of different surveys, we show that in Greece–unlike the other five countries of the sample–social media are more trusted than news media to help individuals navigate their news environment. A thematic analysis of open-ended survey answers indicates that Greek respondents embrace alternative news sources (social media, digital-born outlets) in record-high numbers because of their distrust of traditional news outlets. Taking into account the historic interplay of media and political institutions, we present Greece as a dystopian case for news organisations and the information environment in countries with weak institutions.
Keywords:
alternative news sources; Mass media; media disruption; new media; news consumption; polarised pluralist system; political trust; social media; trust in news

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