Sometimes when I read the news, I think they are out to make me feel old. When I see headlines like the ones below stating that something is “the highest in … years”, most of the time, that doesn’t feel like a long time to me. Honestly, even 20 years is short in the whole scheme of things. Headlines are intentionally written to cause an emotional reaction. That’s all the more reason to let data tell the real story; the key is data literacy. It is the hero that allows us to uncover the truth.
Trying to get an emotional reaction
Yet, newspapers everywhere continue to add numbers to the headlines. Thanks to my handy Headline Analyzer tool, which rates headlines according to sentiment, I know exactly why. The headline “Interest rates were increased yesterday” only gets a score of 43/100. Yet, when I add “…to the highest in 16 years” at the end, it goes up to 72/100. People are much more likely to read it because it has an increased sense of gravity! The problem is that it also gives most people a sense of anxiety.
I hear reactions to these news stories to the tune of “Prices are going up, and soon we won’t be able to afford anything!” and “Things are so much worse now than they used to be!“
Get the real story using data
Yet, when you look at the data without emotion, what is the real story? Thanks to inFormed by Data from IPC Global, I can easily see that the last 20 years were the anomaly, not this one. Interest rates are increasing, but we’re far from uncharted territory. They are just going back to levels they’ve been at for the good part of the last 60 years.
This is an excellent example of the importance of looking at the underlying data. Don’t fall for emotionally charged statements when discussing the impact of interest rate increases. Let the data tell you what is really happening, and go from there.
Data literacy will save the day
The world is full of manipulative news headlines and data literacy is the hero we need to uncover the truth. Newspapers know that the more emotionally engaging a headline is, the more likely people are to read it. Unfortunately, though, this can also easily lead to increased anxiety in the readers. Armed with data literacy skills, individuals can discern the facts from the noise, enabling them to dig deeper into the real situation behind sensational headlines. By critically analyzing data and sources, data literacy empowers us to make informed judgments, fostering a more balanced and accurate understanding of complex issues.
Check out my other posts about data literacy: