Misunderstanding the Harms of Online Misinformation

Misperceptions threaten to warp mass opinion and public policy on controversial issues in politics, science, and health, but we should beware data-free claims and moral panics. 

The 2026 Entman talk reviews the evidence on several widely held myths about misinformation: that most Americans are in online echo chambers, that false news and extreme content are widely consumed, that social media causes widespread harms, and that fact-checks usually backfire. In each case, the conventional wisdom misunderstands the problem in ways that could undermine efforts to effectively address it.

Brendan Nyhan is the James O. Freedman Presidential Professor in the Department of Government at Dartmouth College. Nyhan, a former Professor of Public Policy at the University of Michigan, is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a former Guggenheim Fellow and Carnegie Fellow. He is co-director of Bright Line Watch, a watchdog monitoring the status of American democracy; a former contributor to The Upshot at The New York Times; co-founder of Spinsanity, a non-partisan watchdog of political spin syndicated in the Philadelphia Inquirer; and co-author of All the President's Spin, a New York Times bestseller.

When: Wednesday, March 25 from 4-5pm

Where: Media and Public Affairs Building, B07