Building Civic Competencies: Design and Outcomes in Media Literacy Instruction

This paper explores the collaborative development of an interdisciplinary module to create competencies in the connected areas of critical thinking and media literacy and presents a study analyzing student perceptions of the value, purpose, and effectiveness of the instruction. The emergence of misinformation and disinformation have led to a mistrust of information in general, from politics to science to pop culture. A study of student surveys across multiple semesters and courses supports the notion that instruction in media literacy, with an emphasis on the application of critical thinking, produces positive outcomes among first- and second-year college students. The implications of this study are to the need for and value in increased efforts to tackle misinformation, voter apathy, and democratic backsliding through combined instruction in critical thinking and media literacy in institutions of higher education, particularly among first and second-year undergraduate students.