Media literacy: Five questions that make any headline easier to judge

Media literacy is the habit of asking a few plain questions before trusting a headline. Five do most of the work: who published it, what evidence backs the claim, what independent outlets say, whether the piece informs or sells, and what is missing. No single question settles a story, which is why readers need the whole set. The strongest case for the habit comes from watching skilled readers at work. In a 2019 study in Teachers College Record, researchers Sam Wineburg and Sarah McGrew compared how 45 people judged live websites: ten historians, ten professional fact checkers, and 25 Stanford undergraduates. The fact checkers reached sounder judgments in a fraction of the time, and their edge came from a routine any reader can copy. The routine has a name. Wikipedia’s entry on media literacy, as updated in 2026, defines it as the ability to access, analyze, evaluate, and create media, and lists lateral reading among the practices that build it.

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