Fake News on Social Media and the Implications on Ngor Okpala 2022 House of Assembly Bye Election

Abstract

With the advent of social media, fake news has become rampant that people tend to believe it more than the authentic news. Since social media has become one of the faster means of communication more than other channels of communication, among the younger generations, social media is now a trending means of information dissemination whether true or not. On the other hand, this has created an impact in the political system hence, this work was to ascertain the voting behaviour of citizens particularly the youths who are the major users of social media. A survey of literature in this study shows that despite the flood of fake news in social media, its influence on voting behaviour among the residents in Ngor Okpala LGA of Imo state, has not been adequately researched by intellectuals. The study seeks to find out how frequent voters receive political news on social media and whether the political news they receive on social media influence their perception of candidates and voting behaviour during election. Voters residing at Ngor Okpala LGA of Imo state constituted the population for this study. The study is anchored on two theories of mass communication, social learning and the Uses and gratification theory. The survey method and focus Group Discussion method were adopted using the questionnaire and the Focus Group Discussion Schedule as instrument for data collection. The work concludes that fake news in social media has a little influence on the voting behaviour of a large number of voters.