You may wonder, why do people always say it is so important to read news from multiple different platforms and sources? Well, all news articles express news in a different way, which can easily lead to misinterpretation of news, so looking at multiple different sources of that topic or event will help you gain a broader understanding of that topic or event, and help you create your own opinion without being biased.
The media uses small changes in wording to manipulate your views in ways you won’t always notice. Small changes in wording can make a huge difference to how someone perceives an article.
BBC wrote on a headline:
Brain power dropped among over-50s during Covid-19 pandemic, study shows.
BBC used the word "dropped" which is a little drastic which could bring more attention to the problem, and make it seem like a bigger problem then their actually. News platforms are a type of business so their main agender is to draw people in to read their article. By exaggerating the problem, they are more likely to get more viewers. If we compare BBC's response to The Guardian, The Guardian is a lot less aggressive:
The Guardian wrote on a headline for the same topic:
"Covid pandemic ‘had lasting impact’ on brain health of people aged 50 or over."
The Guardian's headline is more reflective in the way "lasting" suggests that brain health has only decreased a little, making the problem seem less urgent.
Furthermore, looking at the word choice by the two articles, BBC says "Brain power" where as The Guardian says "brain health". By just reading the heading, BBC gives off the impression that peoples brains are not working as well where as The Guardian makes it seem as if it is just the overall health of the old person. These two headlines have a very different tone and give off a very different impression on how dramatic the situation is.
There is no such thing as an unbiased news article as news is written by humans and their opinion will always shine through in one way or another. You also have to remember that each news platform will be targeted to achieve a certain goal.
Overall, looking at multiple different viewpoints and taking your information from different sources will help you gain a broader spectrum of diverse perspectives and viewpoints to help you achieve a better understanding of the wider word. This will help challenge you to stop inhaling information and instead to make sense of it. Reading from multiple sources will help you see the reality rather than just the story's fabricated around it.
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