IMPACT OF SOCIAL MEDIA ON NEWS PERCEPTION AMONG CRESCENT UNIIVERSITY STUDENTS

Digital platforms have become dominant modes of accessing news, the extent to which social media is engaged continues to generate research interests. This research examined how users perceive and engage online news contents, with a view to investigating the relationship between social media use and trust of news contents and identifying factors that influence audience perception and reception of social media news contents. Mixed design was employed. Uses and Gratifications Katz, Blumler and Gurevitch and Agenda-Setting McCombs and Shaw served as the framework. Stratified random sampling and Taro Yamane’s formula was employed to select 362 data, which were collected using questionnaires and interviews. Data were subjected to qualitative analysis! News consumption patterns and trust levels were significantly different. Heuristic cues (likes, shares) and critical reasoning were found to interact in users’ news evaluation of the credibility or validity of news contents. Audience showed active mechanisms of checking news contents, looking out for peer approval and platform algorithms. For news organizations, platform developers, and policy makers, these findings have implications for fostering transparency, algorithmic accountability, and digital media education, contributing to the broader digital credibility conversation and providing culture-based insight into how users in the Global South negotiate or engage the ecosystem of online information dissemination., Keywords: Digital literacy, News credibility, Social media, Online news consumption, Global South Word count: 205