FactCheck.org, the nonpartisan fact-checking site, has introduced a new feature, "SciCheck," to investigate science-based claims in political speech. In a blog post announcing the feature, Eugene Kiely, the director of FactCheck.org, said SciCheck "will focus exclusively on false and misleading scientific claims that are made by partisans to influence public policy."
Peggy Charren, a major force in improving children's television -- and a grassroots activist whose work was honored with the Presidential Medal of Freedom as well as the inaugural Annenberg Public Policy Center award for distinguished lifetime contribution to children's television -- died Jan. 22 at her home outside Boston.
Since President Obama's State of the Union address on Tuesday, FactCheck.org’s posts checking claims in the speech and the GOP responses have been republished on sites across the web and shared thousands of times on social media.
Pollster Peter Hart conducted a focus group with a dozen voters in Aurora, Col., on Jan. 8 for the Annenberg Public Policy Center. Hart, director of APPC's "Voices of the Voters," convened the group just as a new, Republican-controlled Congress takes office and as candidates start emerging for the 2016 election.
Visiting Scholar Jo Holz (ASC ’81) joined the Annenberg Public Policy Center in July to begin work on a sociocultural history of American children’s television. Her resulting book will cover the development of major television shows from the beginning of children’s programming up through present-day offerings.
Supermodel Petra Nemcova was vacationing in Thailand a decade ago, on Dec. 26, when it was hit by a devastating tsunami that destroyed communities in 14 countries and took the lives 230,000 people. Amy Jordan, APPC's associate director, writes in The Hill about Nemcova's work to turn tragedy and social media into social action.
Year after year, the suicide rate is at its lowest in the United States during the holiday season, but nearly three-quarters of U.S. newspaper stories linking suicide and the holidays during the 2013-2014 season incorrectly said the opposite.
PHILADELPHIA — Just in time for Bill of Rights Day (Dec. 15), Annenberg Classroom has released the multiplayer version of a game for middle and high-school students that challenges them to apply their knowledge of the Constitution to everyday legal scenarios. Annenberg Classroom’s “That’s Your Right” game lets students compete against each other online in
As the holidays approach, with their inevitable dinner-table debates among friends and extended family, FlackCheck.org has released a short video that can help people sort fact from fiction when considering email and viral social-media claims. In “Spotting Bogus Claims,” FlackCheck.org, the political literacy site, runs down seven key characteristics of bogus email claims. The three-minute
Parents can become desensitized to violence and sex in movies after watching only a few scenes with disturbing content, according to a new study published in Pediatrics that was conducted by researchers at the Annenberg Public Policy Center. The study comes as scenes of sex and violence become more prevalent in movies aimed at youth. A 2013 study in Pediatrics from APPC researchers showed that the amount of violence in PG-13 movies tripled in the most popular movies since 1985.