This Next Generation What We Know report investigates how young people in the Western Balkans navigate their online information environments and deal with mis/disinformation. The report suggests that for young people trust is rarely unconditional and is mediated through people and ‘proxy signals’, including ‘credibility cues’.
Next Generation What We Know: Mis/disinformation in the Western Balkans investigates how young people aged 18–30 across Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia (the ‘Western Balkans 6’ – WB6) access information, evaluate credibility, and respond to mis/disinformation within their everyday information environments. This study comes at a time when disinformation is an endemic phenomenon, particularly in the Western Balkans. Low levels of trust in media and public institutions have created a fertile environment for the spread of both dis- and misinformation. Young people are especially affected by this rapidly evolving information landscape. At the same time, their perspectives and experiences remain underexplored. This survey was therefore developed to help address that gap by amplifying the voices of youth to better understand how they navigate this landscape and filter the information they are exposed to.
Key findings
Across the WB6, young people describe information environments characterised by high volume, fragmented attention, and a reliance on practical ‘credibility cues’ rather than thorough verification. Trust is rarely unconditional and is often mediated through people and proxy signals.
- Exposure is influenced by platform dynamics and social networks.
Young people often come across claims via recommendations, creators, comments, repost chains, and group chats rather than through intentional news seeking. - Credibility judgements depend on shortcuts under pressure.
Common signals include perceived ‘officialness’, familiar branding, presentation style, engagement metrics, and social endorsement (‘who shared it’). These signals can be useful but are not always dependable. - Checking is experienced as work.
Verification demands time, skills, and motivation, and is often selective. When overwhelmed, young people may delegate checking to trusted individuals, disengage, or regard content as entertainment rather than truth-claims. - Trust is uneven and often contested.
Institutional trust varies across contexts, but scepticisms towards politics and media incentives is common. In lower-trust settings, interpersonal trust and community cues become more influential. - Risk heightens during periods of high salience.
Elections, crises, and polarising social issues amplify exposure and emotional stress. In these moments, feeds can seem ‘unavoidable’, and reactions tend to become anxious, conflicted, avoidant, or hyper-vigilant.
The study suggests that tackling disinformation and improving young people’s information environments in the Western Balkans requires interventions addressing both the individual skills of young people, and the wider systems and communities in which young people live, both on- and offline.
Authors: Ajanović, A. (2026). Next Generation What We Know: Mis/disinformation in the Western Balkans. British Council. https://doi.org/10.57884/EESX-5952
© British Council 2026, licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial 4.0 International Licence