14 Oct 2020, 16:00 CET

PSSI held a debate on the topic of consumers of disinformation on  October 14th,  2020. Its participants, Nikola Hořejš (STEM) and Jonáš Syrovátka (PSSI), debated characteristics and motivations of people consuming, believing in and spreading disinformation. The debate was a follow-up on the research paper “Voices of Central and Eastern Europe: Perceptions of democracy & governance in 10 EU countries”, published by Globsec, to which PSSI contributed. The debate was hosted by Vojtěch Boháč (Voxpot).

Even though disinformation persists as one of the most pressing challenges that contemporary democratic institutions face, there are still wide gaps in our knowledge regarding its consumers. Who are these people? Do they share any common characteristics, or are they rather a wide range of individuals with different backgrounds and motivations? In effort to try to answer some of these questions, PSSI hosted an online debate, where Nikola Hořejš, analyst from STEM and Jonáš Syrovátka, program manager at PSSI, discussed the demographics, characteristics, and motivations of people who consume and spread disinformation on the Czech internet.