📱 24 Hours in My Media Life: What I Learned About Misinformation

Posted by Janai

To fulfill the requirements of this assignment I recorded my media consumption over the course of 24 hours to note how frequently I encounter questionable or misleading content. I anticipated that I would encounter the two types of media only infrequently, however upon completing my 24 hour media consumption log I observed a contrary result, for I often encounter large amounts of questionable or misleading media.

Many argue that the biggest threat to American democracy is in fact misinformation. In this piece, I examine just how pervasive the effects of misinformation can be, looking to everyday life, especially as it occurs on the screens of our smartphones, for examples.

6:30 a.m.

I wake up to a charged phone and a catch up to any important messages or updates from family and friends. While browsing through TikTok today, I stumbled upon a trending video about placing onions in your socks before bed to “pull toxins out of your body.” The video received thousands of likes; however, there was no sufficient explanation as to how the onions were supposed to function. https://www.tiktok.com/@eliyahmashiach/video/7040228450925415686?is_from_webapp=1&sender_device=pc&web_id=7622807531353605646

7:30 a.m.

Check the weather and headlines on my phone. I read a quick update from https://weather.com and skim headlines from the New York Times https://www.nytimes.com. These seem more reliable because they include sources and updated reporting.

9:00 a.m.

Scrolling through Instagram I saw a sponsored post promoting a “natural supplement” that claims to boost energy instantly with “no side effects.”

12:00 p.m.

Strolled over to YouTube and saw a two hour video reviewing a trending product. The creator gives strong opinions but relies only on personal experience. https://youtu.be/lATO_uuZ-w4?si=VvlbNMWWME174O8A

2:30 p.m.

Scroll through X (Twitter) and see a viral post claiming a major company is “secretly shutting down stores nationwide,” with no source linked.

5:00 p.m.

Listen to a podcast referencing research from the Pew Research Center.

6:00 p.m.

See a Facebook post warning about a “new tax law,” but it doesn’t cite any official government source.

8:00 p.m.

Watch TikTok again and see a “life hack” claiming putting your phone in the freezer helps it charge faster. https://www.tiktok.com/@flowstatesam/video/7593930246278188343?is_from_webapp=1&sender_device=pc&web_id=7622807531353605646

Questionable Content I Noticed

Taking a peek at my media diary from the past month is a bit alarming, most of the bad media I consumed came from social media and upon further review a lot of the pieces were over stated or lacked sufficient evidence to back up the claims.

This product is marketing itself as a “detoxifier” by putting onions in your socks. It’s got all natural ingredients so that at first glance it seems plausible, but on further research it seems highly unrealistic to expect any product to “detoxify” your body. According to the official website of the renowned medical center, Mayo Clinic, our bodies have their own built-in detoxifier, the liver and kidneys, and there is no scientific evidence that supports the use of external detox products to remove toxic substances from the body.

I noticed this company first as an Instagram ad for an energy supplement that promised “instant energy, no side effects.” Any “too good to be true” health supplement advertisement is likely a scam, or at least highly misleading, and for this energy supplement, that is certainly the case. The Federal Trade Commission considers such claims to be misleading or even deceptive.

The report that the company behind the e-book stores is shutting down all of its retail stores made waves today, no doubt in part because it created a sense of immediate, pressing news that was later found to lack credible sources. Such tactics are often used by misinformation campaigns to either stoke reaction, or to create an urgent need to share information.

A Facebook post went around yesterday trying to explain some of the provisions of our new tax law. As I am always worried about incorrect information potentially having real effects I have tried to inform my fellow parishioners of the actual truth. After searching I have found no corroboration of this post on the IRS website.

Another “life hack” mythbusted: storing your phone in the freezer will not help disinfect it. This myth is so popular because it is so simple to understand, so easy to try, and requires no special equipment or expertise. Yet people end up believing it because research from the Stanford History Education Group found that people accept online content as true because it’s good enough

🔍 How I Fact-Checked

To verify these claims, I took a more active approach than I normally would. Usually I don’t pay attention to certain things unless I hear the same information on different new sites.

For the onion detox claim, I searched for medical evidence and checked multiple creditable medical sites for information. There was no scientific support for the claim, and multiple sources confirmed it’s a myth.

For the supplement ad, I looked into consumer protection resources like https://consumer.ftc.gov/features/how-avoid-imposter-scams
This helped me understand how common it is for products to use misleading marketing language without real evidence.

To verify the viral company shutdown post, I searched for the claim on creditable news sites like CNN, BBC, and ABC. There were no credible reports confirming it, which suggests it was either false or heavily exaggerated.

For the “new tax law” claim, I checked official government sources like https://www.irs.gov/newsroom and found no evidence supporting the post.

Lastly, for the phone-freezer hack, I did a quick search and found that extreme temperatures can actually damage your phone, making the advice not just false, but potentially harmful.

💭 Reflections

There was some dubious content which was quite alarming, and a lot of it came from social media.

One pattern I noticed is that misinformation often:

Sounds simple and believable
Promises quick fixes
Avoids citing real sources

I’ve become much more skeptical of pieces that purport to give advice on health or ways to save money, while at the same time being completely won over by anything that touts itself as Life Hacks. In fact, I’ve bought a few of the methods for organizing the closet which end up being posted everywhere on the site, and just realized that I could be passing them off to my readers.

I’m going to take it a bit slower and double check some things before I shoot them out as factual. I don’t want to post misinformation.

In the End!!!

I log my consumed media because being media literate is not optional, it is required.

It was a lot to take in, and I was wary to allow it to become fact without doing further research. It taught me to be more vigilant in verifying information that I am exposed to, and how it can be applied in future conversation, and even how easy it is to spread misinformation.