Blog Posts About: facts

With so much information at our fingertips, it can be difficult to know what is trustworthy. A solid first step is understanding the differences between statements of fact and opinion.

This video, our 111th title, is now available in the Common Craft video library. You can watch it in full for a limited time.

What it Teaches:

Every day, we see both facts and opinions in media, education, and more. Being able to tell them apart is an important and powerful skill. Using multiple examples, this video explains the difference between facts and opinions, and how to use that information to your advantage. It teaches:

• How to recognize factual statements
• How to recognize statements of opinion
• Why factual statements can be true or false
• How to verify the accuracy of factual statements
• Why understanding facts and opinions matter in evaluating media

Watch the Video

Note: Each Common Craft video comes with a lesson plan that makes teaching easier. Curious? Download the lesson plan for the video above (PDF).

Some of my days at Common Craft are spent writing scripts for our videos. I think it’s the most important part of my job because the script is where the explanation comes to life and I enjoy every minute of it.

I often use stories or narratives to explain the big ideas in a video by following a character as they learn a new subject or concept. While this kind of story isn’t a good fit for every video, I firmly believe in the power of stories to persuade and relate memorable information. 

In my book, The Art of Explanation, I described the role of stories in explanations like this:

“Facts give stories substance. Stories give facts meaning.” 

Recently, I found research (based on three studies) that sheds light on the role of stories and facts in the context of persuasion. The basic question the researchers, Rebecca J. Krause and Derek D. Rucker, hoped to answer was this: If someone is trying to persuade or influence others, should they use a story or stick to the facts?

The research found that the impact of a story depended on the strength of the facts that were being communicated. You might be wondering: what is a strong fact? From what I can tell, it’s a surprising or meaningful fact. In one study that focused on fictional cell phones, the strong fact was,  “The phone can withstand a fall of up to 30 feet.” The weak fact was, “The phone can withstand a fall of up to 3 feet.”

This article summarized the researcher's findings:

Krause and Rucker found that when facts were weak, a story with the facts embedded within it led to greater persuasion than facts alone. But when facts were strong, the opposite effect occurred: facts alone led to more persuasion than a story with the facts embedded within it. This result suggests that stories don’t just direct people away from weak information; they reduce people’s general processing of information. As a consequence, stories help persuasion when facts are weak, but they hurt persuasion when facts are strong.

As an explainer, I find this fascinating and to some degree, validating. In our work, facts don’t usually play the starring role. Instead of blowing your mind with amazing facts, we focus on clarity and the big picture. In this context, facts are more like supporting players who are there to provide substance for the story. 

For the first time, I've published an article in the Huffington Post.  It's based on an idea that was on my mind through the most recent election season, when facts became such a big news story.  The thesis of the article is that facts, especially in the media, need help.  We can't rely on their very existence to create change.  To be powerful, they need help in the form of context and remarkable or interesting packaging.

In the article I discuss media communication in terms of layers:

These layers are how I frame the problem, which I see as a lack of focus on the bottom layer, fundamentals. For all the visuals and a complete picture of the big idea, head over and take a look at the article.