Study Claims Even the Most Sophisticated News Readers Can Be Manipulated

By Melinda Burns, Miller-McCune.com
Posted on November 9, 2009, Printed on November 10, 2009
http://www.alternet.org/story/143831/

There's nobody more cynical about the media than your average European.

Only 12 percent of Europeans claim to trust the media, compared to 15 percent of North Americans, 29 percent of Pacific Asians and 48 percent of Africans, the BBC has found.

Yet new research out of the London School of Economics and Political Science suggests that even the most hardened Europeans may succumb to media manipulation and change their political views if they are bombarded long enough with biased news.