Like the vast majority of people, my smartphone is often the first thing I look at in the morning and the last thing I look at before falling asleep. My iPhone serves as my alarm, my GPS, and my music player. Most importantly, it's the primary way I communicate with loved ones and stay on top of an evolving and overwhelming news cycle. I’m not alone in this regard.
A recent Pew study indicates 86 percent of American adults say they “at least sometimes” get news from a smartphone. Another study found that 20 percent of Americans feel “overloaded by information.” While these numbers provide some useful insights, many existing studies of American media consumption and social media use fail to closely analyze — or omit entirely — a key segment of the population: Asian Americans. Compared to the average American, Asian Americans have drastically different media consumption habits. For first-generation and limited-English proficient individuals, these contrasts are even greater.
The need for nuance
I use WeChat, for example, to lurk in extended family group chats, watch cooking videos, and see pictures of my cousin’s newborn baby. But for first-generation Chinese Americans like my parents, WeChat — a popular instant messaging and social networking platform used by members of the Chinese diaspora — is a key source of local, national, and international news. This subtle difference highlights a larger problem in current research, which flattens a diverse community of dozens of ethnic groups into a high-achieving, tech-savvy monolith, and assumes someone like me, who was born and raised in the United States, has the same habits as newer arrivals and English-language learners. Despite Asian Americans being the fastest growing ethnic group in the United States, many conversations around misinformation and media literacy do not consider Asian Americans
Such misconceptions and the limited nuanced research into Asian American media consumption habits inspired my team at Asian Americans Advancing Justice – AAJC to learn more. We conducted 12 focus groups with 101 Asian American individuals between the ages of 15 and 91. We curated diversity across ethnic groups, immigration generation, and English-language proficiency in the participants we recruited. Through the sessions, we tested hypotheses about media consumption based on anecdotal evidence and personal experiences. These sessions had additional personal connections for me: They took place where I grew up (metro Detroit), where I went to college (Washington, D.C.), and where I live now (the San Francisco Bay Area).
We must better understand the insidious ways misinformation impacts our communities.
It was an opportunity to hear directly from the diversity of voices in my community, and a rare chance to document the experiences of Asian Americans in their 70s and 80s (and even a few in their 90s). We learned a humbling fact: Survival was their central concern on a daily basis — not politics. When talking about older generations’ susceptibility to misinformation, I sometimes find myself making dismissive comments about “lack of political understanding” or “political apathy.” Hearing the worries of these folks underscored the importance of empathy and understanding why certain individuals may scorn or turn away from politics.
American centrism obscures reality
Language limitations play a part, too — but not in the way many may think. In an American context, people usually refer to how limited English fluency impacts an individual’s abilities to consume news, forcing them to turn towards alternative media sources. In contrast, we found that limited fluency in the languages of their parents or ancestors made it more difficult for second- and later generation Asian Americans to keep up with news from their home countries, subjecting them to “U.S.-centric” views of the world. I fall into this category. While I consider myself Chinese-English bilingual when it comes to speaking and listening, my Chinese reading and writing abilities are around an eighth-grade level. As a result, I gravitate towards English-language sources.
A media outlet cannot simply translate from English into, say, Korean and expect their content to be digestible or understandable to all Korean Americans.
Communicating cultural context and nuance, which isn't as straightforward as translating the text from one language to the other, is also important. A media outlet cannot simply translate from English into, say, Korean and expect their content to be digestible or understandable to all Korean Americans. Factors like immigration generation and language ability impact the sources individuals seek out, and translated resources have limitations, two issues our report, "Beyond Language Translation: Asian Americans, News and Information Seeking, and the Circulation of Problematic Narratives Online," dives into.
Building a more culturally-relevant media environment
Across the demographics we interviewed — from residents in metro Detroit suburbs to San Francisco’s Chinatown — individuals cited more trust in local news than national outlets, describing them as more insulated from partisan politics. I was happy to hear this — in the various places I have lived, local news sources have always helped me feel connected to and informed about my immediate community. At a time when credible journalism is increasingly paywalled and attacked by politicians, it is more important than ever to protect news at the hyper-local level. And well-informed communities are best equipped to navigate and combat misinformation, conspiracy theories, scams, and more.
To ensure Asian Americans have access to accurate and relevant information, we must uplift media education designed by and for communities. Vietnamese American elders who are skeptical of non-traditional media sources should be offered in-language media literacy courses addressing their skepticism in a culturally competent, empathetic manner. Younger Asian Americans who get their news through social media and are experimenting with generative AI need training on ethical, safe use. Rather than simply offering translated voting materials, community organizations should educate community members on how elections may be different in the United States compared to individuals’ home countries.
And more than ever, we must better understand the insidious ways misinformation impacts our communities — and how we can fight back.
Jenny Liu is the senior manager of disinformation and misinformation policy for Asian Americans Advancing Justice - AAJC, a nonprofit advocacy network dedicated to advancing the civil and human rights of Asian Americans in pursuit of a more equitable society. This column represents the opinions of the author.
