Can civic science rebuild trust in an AI-flooded media landscape?
Balancing innovation with vigilance in civic science reporting
As the Civic Science Fellow at the Center for Cooperative Media, I’ve spent much of my time working on our civic science journalism collaborations grant program and conducting surveys about public trust in science. It’s no secret that public trust in science is in a dismal state, but what might not be as obvious are the deeper reasons why that is the case.
While I don’t claim to have all the answers, here’s what I do know: The erosion of trust in science journalism is, in large part, because there is simply too much low-quality information out there.
According to NewsGuard, an organization dedicated to tracking unreliable news, there are over 1,200 websites producing almost entirely AI-generated, misleading content across 16 languages. And I’m sure we’ve all felt it, too. How often do we pause, question the veracity of a claim, and feel completely overwhelmed by the constant flood of news? We have a limited amount of attention to give, and AI has exponentially increased the amount of content being pushed our way.
But people don’t need more noise. They need information they can trust — information that is relevant to them.
This is where civic science gives me hope — offering an opportunity to make news local and participatory again. As a fellow, I’ve had the privilege of learning from the results of early civic science journalism collaborations.
One example is the Salt Lake Tribune’s Collaborative Water Documenters Program, funded through the Center for Cooperative Media’s Civic Science Journalism Collaborations pilot grant program. The project helped residents better understand local water usage and identify conservation solutions by paying student documenters (who were trained by experts from other organizations) to attend and document public meetings about water use across various government bodies.
These students created written records and summarized the findings of conservation initiatives, which were made publicly available through a searchable database — becoming a resource for journalists.
And, at least according to Kelly Cannon, the Salt Lake Tribune’s community engagement editor, “It changed the way we generate story ideas.”
This, to me, encapsulates the power of local, community-centered journalism — and it’s something AI could actually amplify. In fact, both the Financial Times and the Wall Street Journal are experimenting with AI models that predict trending topics to help journalists identify gaps in coverage.
And while generative AI in news and journalism may sound like a new trend, it’s not—journalists have been using machine learning and other forms of AI for years to assist with everything from social media monitoring to organizing large datasets and streamlining editorial workflows. These tools help journalists scale up reporting, reduce time spent on mundane tasks, and detect relationships within data that would otherwise be difficult to discern.
What excites me is the potential to apply these same tools on a hyperlocal level.
Imagine if civic science journalism projects could leverage AI to make their reporting even more efficient — cutting down on administrative work and freeing up time to focus on what really matters: making news more relevant, more local, and, ultimately, more civic.
Of course, we must also remain vigilant and ensure that AI isn’t hijacked by bad actors who use it to generate disinformation or spread malicious deep fakes. This is a challenge we can’t ignore. But I see a future where AI becomes a tool for enhancing the kind of local, participatory journalism that can help rebuild trust in both science and journalism itself. A future where communities are not just passive consumers of news but active participants in the stories that shape their world.
At the intersection of AI and civic science journalism, there’s a chance to revitalize the media landscape—and, hopefully, restore some of the public trust that has been lost along the way.
Catherine Devine is the 2024–2025 Civic Science Fellow at the Center for Cooperative Media at Montclair State University. Contact her via email at devinec@montclair.edu.
About the Center for Cooperative Media: The Center is a primarily grant-funded program of the School of Communication and Media at Montclair State University. Its mission is to grow and strengthen local journalism and support an informed society in New Jersey and beyond. The Center is supported with funding from Montclair State University, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation, Democracy Fund, the New Jersey Civic Information Consortium, the Independence Public Media Foundation, Rita Allen Foundation, Inasmuch Foundation, and John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. For more information, visit centerforcooperativemedia.org.