The Role of Media Literacy in Shaping News Use among University Students of Bangladesh

This study delves into the role of news literacy in shaping news use behavior of Bangladeshi University students. Specifically, it examines the level of news literacy among students. Based on a survey (N = 308), this study investigates the relationship between university students’ news literacy level (various constructs of news literacy, and online news verification) and their news use behaviors (news consumption via news media, and social media). It employed descriptive statistics to unveil demographic relationship with various factors of news literacy and news verification ability. Further, the role of various types of news literacy in university students’ news use was conducted by employing regression analysis in SPSS software. The findings show that there was no significant difference in news literacy level between students majoring in media-related disciplines and those in non-media disciplines. Besides, student’s ability to verify news online was also found to be a moderate level. On top of this, this study reveals that news literacy construct of authors and audience has strong and positive association with news use via news media. Similarly, self-perceived news literacy and news verification ability respectively have strong relationship with news use via social media. The findings of the current study provide insights into the understanding of students’ news literacy level and their ability to verify news online which would play a vital role in navigating information in online landscape.