Recommendations
Methodology
The Commission used both qualitative and quantitative research with students, school staff and parents to find out how each group understands the problem of conspiracy theories, misinformation and disinformation, and how they thought it should be tackled. Underpinning this research was a detailed literature review and a series of expert Evidence Sessions to ensure that the Commission built on the existing knowledge and expertise across the sector.
The work of the Commission was delivered across four phases from March to November 2024:
Figure 1 – Four phases of the Commission
Phase 1 – Existing Literature and Expert Evidence:
The aim of Phase 1 was to ensure the Commission built on and harnessed the existing evidence on conspiracy theories, misinformation, disinformation and how the challenges of each of these manifests in schools.
This literature review (available in full in Appendix 2) has underpinned the subsequent research of the Commission and this report. In addition, the Commission undertook to hear directly from a series of experts in three oral expert Evidence Sessions and a series of one-to-one interviews. These experts included:
Table 1 – experts who provided evidence to the Commission.
Phases 2, 3 and 4 took the same methodological approach, with three different groups: young people, school staff and parents.
Phase 2 – Young People
The young people who participated in this research were between the age of 11 and 18 and in secondary or post-16 education. Although we know that that conspiracy belief, misinformation and disinformation do not manifest solely in young people aged over 11, we chose to focus on this age group for two key reasons. First, the transition to secondary school is often associated with additional freedom and autonomy for young people, which may make them more vulnerable to online harm. Second, unlike very young children, young people over the age of 11 can consent (with parental approval) to being involved in polling and focus groups. Given the contentious nature of the topic, ensuring that young people could provide informed consent was important for the ethical running of this research.
We ran an anonymous, online survey targeting 2,349 young people in full-time education, aged 11 to 18, from 5-13 May 2024.
We undertook a series of ten focus groups with young people in different schools across England. These groups were undertaken between May and November 2024. Each group was undertaken in person at the students’ schools during the school day, facilitated by two trained Public First researchers.
All focus groups were undertaken in a semi-structured format, with key discussion questions and flexibility for the discussion to be led by young people. Student participants were identified through their schools, with a lead teacher supporting Public First facilitators to arrange the groups.
The groups were designed to target two different age groups of pupils: Year 9 pupils (KS3) and Year 12 pupils (KS5). Two of the groups were single-sex groups.
Table 2 – Pupil focus group demographics.
Phase 3 – School staff
Throughout the research carried out for this Commission, we have referred to ‘school staff’ rather than ‘teachers’. This was a deliberate choice to cast the net more widely across schools to include all staff who work in schools, rather than just teaching staff. Although some of the challenges identified in this research doubtless manifest specifically within a classroom setting and are dealt with by teachers, conspiracy belief, misinformation and disinformation do not respect the walls of the classroom, and we felt it important to include all staff working in schools. This included (but is not limited to) teaching assistants, catering staff, school site and maintenance teams, IT support staff, cleaning staff and cover supervisors. Anyone who worked regularly in a school was identified as a potential research participant. Where ‘teachers’ were identified as a particular subgroup, they have been described as such.
We ran an anonymous, online survey targeting 448 school staff at UK secondary schools and colleges on the week commencing 24 June.
We ran six focus groups with school staff. School staff focus groups were independently recruited for a mixture of roles, both teaching and non-teaching. They were also recruited to include mixed gender, ethnicity and geographic demographics. Participants were from state schools only.
All the school staff focus groups were run online, facilitated by a Public First researcher. They were undertaken in a semi-structured format, with key discussion questions and flexibility for the discussion. These focus groups ran between 20 June and 1 August 2024.
Table 3 – school staff focus group demographics.
In addition to our independently recruited groups, we undertook an additional focus group with teachers and support staff of pupils with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (henceforth SEND) which was recruited through Public First’s existing networks. This was a group of seven participants, which included the Safeguarding Lead, Head of Sixth Form and Headteacher, as well as classroom teachers and support staff from across the secondary section of the school. The school takes pupils from 2 to 19 years with severe, profound and multiple learning disabilities, including autism. The focus group was undertaken online and used the same semi-structured format as the rest of the groups.
Phase 4 – Parents
The final phase of this research focused on parents of young people in full-time education aged 11-18.
We ran an anonymous, online survey which encompassed 2,009 parents of young people in full-time education aged 11 to 18 from 10-19 July 2024.
We ran six focus groups with parents of young people. These groups were independently recruited to include a mix of ages and genders, within specific geographic bounds. All parents had to have at least one secondary-aged child. We excluded parents who worked in the following fields to avoid bias: technology, digital media, social media, education. We recruited specifically for social class in these groups, in order to achieve a broad sample, reflective of wider society.
All the parent focus groups were run online and facilitated by a Public First researcher. They were undertaken in a semi-structured format, with key discussion questions and flexibility for the discussion. These focus groups ran on the week commencing 29th July.
Table 4 – parent focus group demographics.
Throughout this research, we refer to different socioeconomic groups, as defined by the National Readership Survey’s Social Grade system.1 Social Grade is a classification system based on occupation and is based on the main income earner in the household.
The classifications are:
% of Population as defined in the National Readership Survey January – December 2016
Polling:
Public First is a member of the British Polling Council, and company partners of the Market Research Society. Public First adheres to the professional standards set out by these bodies, including our duty of transparency. Full polling tables for all three polls undertaken in this research are available on Public First’s website.
As with all opinion polls, there is a margin of error in the answers, and the margin of error is greater when sample sizes are smaller (when there are cross-breaks of specific groups of people). For pupils and parents, the margin of error is +/-3%. For school staff, it is +/-4%. All polling numbers in this report should be read on this basis.
Safeguarding and Ethical Research:
Inherent within the Commission were significant ethical considerations that had to be considered and navigated in order to ensure that the research did not cause harm to any individual or groups.
Public First has broad experience of undertaking research with vulnerable groups and on politically sensitive and challenging issues, including with young people, individuals with special educational needs and minority groups.
The Commission, and its research partner Public First, are committed to the very highest standards of ethical conduct in our research, and we adhere to the professional standards set out by the Market Research Society, of which we are members.2Market Research Society (2024). Available: https://www.mrs.org.uk/standards/ethics/3 Specific attention was paid to ensuring that informed consent was given by all participants prior to taking part in the research, particularly the young people who took part, and their parents. Additional safeguarding measures were put in place with the schools who supported this project, and a named contact was provided for young people after each focus group so that any concerns could be addressed.
The identifying features of all participants have been anonymised to protect their privacy. This report uses so called ‘thick description’ – detailed observations of characteristics and contextto narrate and interpret what has been observed and discussed within a broader context, and provides analysis based upon the voices of participants. Their words remain unchanged.
Public First’s goal with this research was to explore how conspiracy theories are understood. We did not conduct this research in order to find out how widely held beliefs are, or to test how believable different theories would be. Instead, our questions and research focus on the perceptions of conspiracy theories, the downstream effects, and how educators can best respond. At all stages of the research, when specific examples of conspiracy theories were discussed, the research team made explicitly clear that these were widely discredited or had no factual basis.
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