This repository contains the data for:
Ognyanova, K., Lazer, D., Robertson, R. E., & Wilson, C. (2020). Misinformation in action: Fake news exposure is linked to lower trust in media, higher trust in government when your side is in power. The Harvard Kennedy School (HKS) Misinformation Review, Volume 1, Issue 4.
https://misinforeview.hks.harvard.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/Misinformation-in-action-Ognyanova-et-al-2020.pdf
The data used in this study was collected by the opinion polling company YouGov. A total of 3,000 participants completed two surveys conducted shortly before and after the 2018 U.S. midterm elections. The first survey wave was fielded between October 18 and October 24 of 2018. The second wave was collected between November 23 and December 1 of 2018. Out of the 3,000 respondents who completed both survey waves, a subsample of 227 (8%) agreed to install the browser extension and participate in the digital data collection. This is the sample used for the current study.
During the initial recruitment, survey respondents were also invited to participate in our digital data collection taking place in October and November of 2018. Individuals who consented were asked to install a browser extension compatible with Google Chrome and Firefox. This extension operated until December 1 and periodically collected the web browsing history of each participant.
weight : Data weight based on 2018 ACS demographics
conf_wh : Confidence in the White House; 1 (None) to 5 (A great deal)
conf_cong : Confidence in Congress; 1 (None) to 5 (A great deal)
conf_sc : Confidence in the Supreme Court; 1 (None) to 5 (A great deal)
conf_mil : Confidence in the military; 1 (None) to 5 (A great deal)
conf_crim : Confidence in the criminal justice system; 1 (None) to 5 (A great deal)
conf_gov : Average of the five political confidence variables
conf_wh_w2 : Confidence in the White House, WAVE 2
conf_cong_w2 : Confidence in Congress, WAVE 2
conf_sc_w2 : Confidence in the Supreme Court, WAVE 2
conf_mil_w2 : Confidence in the military, WAVE 2
conf_crim_w2 : Confidence in the criminal justice system, WAVE 2
conf_gov_w2 : Average of the five political confidence variables, WAVE 2
conf_med : Condidence in mainstream media; 1 (None) to 5 (A great deal)
conf_med_w2 : Confidence in mainstream media, WAVE 2
female : Gender; 1 (female), 0 (male)
race_white : Race; White Non-Hispanic (1), other (0)
race_black : Race; Black (1), other (0)
race_asian : Race: Asian (1), other (0)
race_hisp : Ethnicity; Latino/Hispanic (1), other (0)
age : Age in years
educ : Education; 1 (Less than high school) to 6 (Graduate degree)
income : Income range; 1 (Under $10,000) to 16 (Over $500,000)
dem : Party affiliation; 1 (Democrat), 0 (other)
rep : Party affiliation; 1 (Republican), 0 (other)
ideology : Political ideology; 1 (Very liberal) to 5 (Very conservative)
interest_pol: Interest in politics; 1 (Not at all interested) to 5 (Extremely interested)
news_nat : Following national news; 1 (Not closely at all) to 4 (Very closely)
tot_news : Number of news sites visited by respondents (log-transformed)
fake_urls : Exposure to fake news; 1 (Exposed), 0 (Not exposed)
fox_news : Exposure to Fox news; 1 (Exposed), 0 (Not exposed)
breit_news : Exposure to Breitbart; 1 (Exposed), 0 (Not exposed)