Media Bias: A Product of Human Nature

Well-known social psychologist Leon Festinger coined the term cognitive dissonance (1957).    He used this theory to describe the uncomfortable feeling one has by holding conflicting ideas simultaneously.    Hence, so the theory goes, it is the tendency to avoid discomfort that leads one into either resisting conflicting information that comes our way or more commonly accepting and selecting only that information which matches our preexisting bias.

Bias Within

The basic forms of bias are those within the individual and those that come to us from information resources.  The complexity of evaluating either is significant.   As a researcher we need to understand we are human.   Over time we can have a tendency to attach to and to defend beliefs or research into which we have invested a great deal of time and energy.   We also have political religious or spiritual perspectives, and unique family backgrounds giving us idiosyncratic viewpoints.   Finally, we are subtly and continuously influenced by our culture and surroundings.   
Within ourselves social science has demonstrated we can have known biases in thinking, judgment and memory (Kida, 2006).  This is known as confirmation bias.  Plous (p.233, 1993) defines confirmation bias as “a tendency for people to favor information that confirms their preconceptions or hypotheses regardless of whether the information is true.”

Bias Without - Technology Bias

A new field of research, the CASA paradigm - short for computers as social actors - suggests many of us actually treat computers as if they are human and hence interact accordingly.  This paradigm suggests we take care not to hurt the computer's ‘feelings’ suggesting we come to see our technology platforms as confidants and personal assistants who keep track of our lives and win our affection and scorn (Nass & Yen, 2010).  This can lead us to behave in biased ways towards the instruments of media themselves.   With this growing trust and affection we may come to view the content that these technologies deliver into our lives with less scrutiny.   To test whether this kind of human-computer bonding is occurring in your social circle simply ask five friends which do they prefer, a Mac or a PC?   One will witness first-hand the impassioned emotional response such a question generates.

Robot Bias Equals Search Engine Bias

Studies have also shown the algorithms that make up a search tool, can be biased to seek one type of information over another while preferring one type of website structure over another.  This leads to search engines that produce very different results when searching the same query (Van der Graaf, 2010).    An entire industry dedicated to generating this type of search selection bias has arisen to help one’s site stand out above the multitudes.

This bias also works counter-directionally regarding search engines.    According to a study by Penn State researchers (Giles et al, 2007), web site policy makers who use robots.txt files as gatekeepers to specify what is open and what is off limits to Web crawlers favor Google over other search engines.  The net result is that Google is able to index pages that other search engines cannot and is thus favored by webmasters.



Bias Antidotes - Becoming Aware and Staying Informed

The John’s Hopkins University, Sheridan Libraries web page on Evaluating Information (Johns Hopkins, n.d.) clearly states that all information is presented with motive or a point of view.   It persuasively and logically argues we need to follow a basic protocol of critical web source analysis similar to those we have already been trained in for evaluating any source, including reviewing:
· information about the author and his/her qualifications for speaking on the subject,
· the publisher and its credibility,
· the quality of the writing,
· the research method(s) used,
· how the data found is presented and fit together to develop the conclusion,
· sources cited and their credibility, and
· currency.

Aside from website specific analysis of bias, author bias must also be considered.  Does the author discuss the topic from an apparently objective point of view or is his or her writing reflecting one or more biases?

Whois in Charge
Understanding the website registration process and it’s potential for manipulation is a central skill for online media bias detection.  The three most common URL manipulations are:
Cybersquatting involves registering, selling or using a copyrighted domain name of another organization or individual in bad faith or for profit of sale to the trademark owner of the name.
Typosquatting is the registration of the most common misspellings of trademark names in particular for the same type of bad faith uses as mentioned above.                
URL cause co-opting occurs when an individual, group or corporate interests present a site or organization as if it is in support of a cause or to add unearned legitimacy to their contradictory views in order to help shape the public relations messaging.    Examples include what is known as greenwashing by event hosting Houston Earth Day 2010, sponsored by Marathon Oil or a white supremacy group registering and posting www.martinlutherking.org.

Media psychologists, position themselves as scholarly professionals and intermediaries between media’s messaging and understanding the structure of this message in the mind of the receiver (Hare, G., 2010).  We also then must accept responsibility and commit ourselves to developing sophisticated bias detection skills.   Along with this skill comes obligation to disseminate information on countering media bias.

Humility - The Touchstone of Bias Defense

Cultivation of humility is perhaps the strongest character trait to foster as an antidote to bias and truth seeking.  Examining media bias leads to the gray areas of life becoming more comfortable places for scholars and social thinkers like media psychologists.   We are entering into a dialogue with the voices of history and posing questions for the minds of the future that will come upon our ideas.   Picking up pebbles on the seashore of knowledge, as Newton’s famous quote below hints.   The process of human truth seeking is by its very nature gradual and cumulative.

Sir Issac Newton

 I do not know what I may appear to the world, 

but to myself I seem to have been only 

like a boy playing on the seashore, 

and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or

a prettier shell than ordinary, 

whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me.

Truth’s invitation welcome’s all to stand together on the seashore of this Ocean of Truth, shoulder to shoulder, from an ever-widening vantage point and inhale, sigh and breathe.