Vaughan Davis

Yeah.

Or maybe you just get sick of being stared at.

I don't know.

No.

There you go.

You're asked a closed question.

No, it's not.

And I'm very, very interested in the idea of reported trust or self-reported trust when it comes to media of any sort and social media and digital platforms in particular.

It has become fashionable in the last five to ten years to profess that you don't trust the media and you don't trust the internet.

Because, you know, trust is kind of on the spectrum next to gullibility and no one wants to appear gullible.

You know, it's almost simple minded to report to a researcher or a survey that you trust the media or you trust the Internet.

I'm much more interested in observable behavior.

So when I did my psychology degree a very long time ago, I was drawn towards behaviorism, which is seeing the self as a black box, unknowable behavior.

And all we can really talk about is behaviour.

And when we look at behaviour, people are flocking to the internet.

They're flocking to social media platforms, despite saying year on year that they trust them less.

96% of New Zealanders are regular internet users, and that's just about the highest number in the world.

It's higher than the United States.

So on the one hand, we say, oh, we don't trust this thing.

But we use it more and more and more.