Introduction

At present the thinking of a professional in various fields should be multifunctional, mobile and varied, analytical, critical, and systematic. Therefore, the universal competence “systems and critical thinking” is of particular importance for developing the education system. The need to develop critical thinking among students is that higher education develops a person's thinking in professional orientation. In the interaction of personality and media content critical thinking allows a person to track how information varies depending on the context in which it is presented. Students actively interact with the media referring to the media as a source of useful and interesting information. Students are often not highly motivated to refer to textbooks. Students are inherently striving for accessible information requiring much effort and time for perception and processing. The same information can be differently emotionally colored and substantiated by different rational arguments. Therefore, the development of students' critical thinking includes clarifying how teachers relate to the functioning of information contained in the media sphere concerning the Fake News phenomenon.

Learning decision-making and the moral decision system define human beliefs about what Fake News is how they influence our behavior and choices in many everyday situations. However in teachers of schools colleges and universities this area of belief plays a unique role. Since the teacher presents the media content functioning and Fake News in the media space forms daily didactic choice however it is also assimilated and accepted by students. Consequently the critical pedagogical issue is how the implementation of the teacher's beliefs regarding media content and Fake News in the media space affects a system of representing knowledge in teaching students.

The study aims to determine how university professors critically perceive and evaluate information when interacting with the media sphere. The article presents an analysis of theoretical issues of critical thinking in the media sphere and the results of empirical research, Namely a questionnaire survey of teachers. The empirical part of the study interprets the questions about how critical educators are about content in the media space. The questionnaire was attended by teachers from Ural Federal University named after the first President of Russia B.N. Yeltsin, Ural State Pedagogical University (Ekaterinburg, Russia). Linguistics University of Nizhny Novgorod (Nizhny Novgorod, Russia). The study examines the issues of the attitude of teachers of socio-humanitarian areas to Fake news and whether they are influenced by factors pushing towards an uncritical attitude towards information in the media sphere. The study's relevance is due to the insufficient elaboration of Russian teachers' attitude to the information contained in the media sphere which is significant in developing students' critical thinking.

Materials and Methods

The article is devoted to studying how university professors critically perceive and evaluate information when interacting with the media sphere. The article uses methods of analysis of theoretical issues of critical thinking in the media sphere. Obtaining the empirical part of the research is based on compiling questions conducting questionnaires of teachers. analyzing data. The empirical part of the research is interpreted to study the critical attitude of teachers to media content. The research methods are theoretical analysis of philosophical pedagogical and psychological literature on critical thinking in the media sphere and analysis of the results of processing empirical data midday due to a questionnaire survey of teachers. The main measuring instrument in the study is a questionnaire survey of university professors with various lengths of service. The study involved 76 teachers from Ural Federal University named after the first President of Russia B.N. Yeltsin. Ural State Pedagogical University (Ekaterinburg. Russia). Linguistics University of Nizhny Novgorod (Nizhny Novgorod, Russia). The analysis of empirical data was based on an inductive approach. At the first stage of the study the teachers' perceptions of their critical attitude to Fake News in the media space were identified and described. Then the questions for the survey were drawn up considering the identification of teachers' attitudes towards factors that contribute to an uncritical attitude towards media content. The second phase of the study focused on the analysis of the obtained empirical data and conclusions. The presented empirical data is a toolkit for studying the subjective measurement of educational reality. Generalization and designation of the teachers' answers' characteristics become the basis for methodological and practice-oriented conclusions.

Key Concepts in Fake News Phenomenon

This study is based on many studies that reveal the factors that contribute to the existence of Fake News on social media which contributes to the development of a critical media strategy. Modern people are immersed in the world of information technology which has led to the fact that social media has become a reality for millions of people. The media have reached the level of almost instantaneous reaching of addressees of various age and social groups. There are practically no barriers to the entry of interested individuals into the media industry including creating a website and monetizing web content using advertising platforms (McNair, 2017). This circumstance leads to the need to discuss the existence of the Fake News phenomenon. The development of information technologies leads to the fact that they can positively connect people, for example through social networks. On the other hand information technologies contribute to a manipulative influence on people i.e., negatively connecting people through surveillance, tracking and targeted advertising. The media sphere carries information but also presents the information as desired. i.e., forms desires and thinking patterns (Luhmann, 2000; Fuchs, 2014; McLean, 2016). This means that the media sphere is influenced by the misbehavior of people, their actions. This circumstance exacerbates the issues of media education as a priority for the development of modern education (Kerimov et al., 2020; Tomyuk et al., 2020; Kirillova, 2020). In this regard, the safety of information from the Internet by children. Adolescents and adults is the subject of several studies, which emphasize the importance of implementing large-scale media educational projects (Kokhanaya, 2011; Sukhodolov, 2020).

One of the main tasks of higher education is to form students' critical thinking to fulfill professional tasks. Various forms of education are being developed. Modern forms of education include using information and communication technologies directly when conducting offline classes and online classes (Sloman, 2001; Nazarov et al., 2020; Khan et al., 2020). Critical thinking involves a person's ability to work with critical and analytical materials, possession, skills in identifying key ideas in texts, recognition of arguments, use of evidence, and expert testimony. As a result, the development of critical thinking contributes to the formation of academic honesty in students, which is one of the conditions for developing a modern academic and student community (Khan et al., 2020; Eaton, 2020b).

Educational researchers agree that critical thinking is one of the most important personality traits today. However, as S. Hale notes. “The number of definitions of critical thinking is approximately equal to the number of works written on this topic” (Hale, 2008). However, J. Dewey's concept of reflective thinking lays the foundations for subsequent discussions regarding this concept. Dewey does not use the term “critical thinking”; however, the way Dewey describes reflexive thinking, modern researchers identify with critical thinking (Hitchcock, 2020). Dewey defines reflexive thinking as active, persistent, and attentive consideration of any opinion and analysis of further conclusions to which it leads (Dewey, 1993).

The development of a critical type of thinking is the goal of the modern education system. The development of critical thinking is the goal of the modern system of training specialists in various areas of professional activity. Critical thinking acquires special significance in the activities of specialists responsible for people's lives, i.e., medical workers (Ahmady, 2020; Cui et al., 2021; Florek, 2016). Modern research in critical thinking is focused on the development of skills and abilities of critical thinking. In 1941, Glazer systematized these skills and abilities when creating a test for critical thinking “Watson Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal”. On the example of one of the versions of the test publication (Watson – Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal, 2021), it is aimed at assessing the following skills:

• The construction of inferences (a person should be able to substantiate inferences from many factual statements and assess their validity).

• Defining assumptions (in a series of statements. a person must identify unspoken assumptions or premises).

• Assessment of arguments (a person must determine whether conclusions necessarily follow from the information contained in these statements or premises or only relate to it associatively).

• Deductively reason (whether a person should follow generalizations or conclusions from the data presented).

• Logical interpretation (a person must evaluate the presented arguments for consistency. simplicity. the possibility of entering a more general knowledge system).

The value of E. Glazer's concept lies in the idea that a person is inherent in an attitude and readiness for critical thinking. Skills measured by the test, in a broader sense, record a person's willingness to consider problems and phenomena deliberately. A. Fisher notes an essential point in E. Glazer's theory: “there is no point in possessing these skills, but one cannot use them when necessary, it is important to develop the habit of using them, to be ready to use them” (Fisher, 2001). Subsequently, the issues of critical thinking as the development of human ability and measurable construction were widely considered and discussed by researchers (Chipmen, 1989; Moore, 1998).

The American scientist R. Ennis focuses on intellectual skills in critical thinking and attitudes towards it. R. Ennis gives the following definition of critical thinking: “making deliberate decisions about how to act and what to believe” (Ennis, 1996). For Ennis, the educational aspect in the formation of critical thinking is significant. Ennis notes that the interdisciplinary nature of mastering critical thinking, i.e., the development of intellectual skills does not imply a specific scientific discipline aimed at the formation and development of these skills. Instead, Ennis assumes that the student has knowledge in this area and that the process of critical thinking itself is deductive.

Building a knowledge society determines the development trends of modern education. A person must analyze information and assess the probability of its reliability, which leads to accepting or ignoring information from different sources. These skills testify to the developed critical thinking of a person. Critical understanding of information gives it the status of knowledge: “In knowledge societies, each person will have to be able to navigate the flow of information that overwhelms us freely and develop cognitive abilities and critical mind to distinguish useful information from useless” (UNESCO: Towards knowledge societies: UNESCO world report, 2005). The point of view seems to be fair that “knowledge can be complete only when the mechanisms of personality development are switched on” (Korzhuev et al., 2001). In the modern model of the Open University, this idea is becoming one of the trends in the development of higher education (Gilyazova, 2019).

In 1990, 47 experts (the US and Canada) were formed to discuss key issues in critical thinking. As a result of these discussions, the definition of Peter Facione appeared: by critical thinking, we mean a purposeful, self-regulating system of judgments used for interpreting. Analysing, evaluating and formulating conclusions, as well as to explaining the evidence-based. Conceptual, methodological or contextual reasoning on which itself the system of judgments is based (Facione, 2021). Paul offers the following definition of critical thinking: “Critical thinking is thinking about thinking when you are thinking to improve your thinking. Simultaneously, two points are of decisive importance: critical thinking – entailing self-improvement, which comes with the skills of using the standards of correct assessment of the thought process” (Paul, 1990). From our perspective, the definitions of Facione & Paul are essential for applying critical thinking in the analysis of the media sphere. They include a person's awareness of the thinking process, “thinking about thinking”. They assume that a person can assess the effectiveness of intellectual skills and understand the source of errors, which a person can do when studying information, communication. In addition to this aspect of skills, developing the attitudinal or motivational aspects of the student's critical thinking is necessary. As a result, it is possible to identify whether the problem-solving format is stereotyped or standardized and uses trial and error methods in experiments with alternative approaches.

Uncritical perception of media content by students and teachers leads to the fact that they cannot study media content and choose ways of thinking. Many Universities are currently introducing courses specifically designed to enhance students' ability to think critically to meet general education requirements. These strategies are stereotypical, and they are described as affective in the Internet space. One of the exciting studies of the connection with this issue is discussing voters' trust in political parties. However, the question of “trust in political parties directly depends on who” and “how effectively” governs the country” (Novgorodtseva et al., 2016). This question is rather complicated (Loginov, 2020; Bentwich, 2017) and far from a specific situation in the media sphere concerning trust in information content.

Davies & Barnett note an essential aspect of critical thinking: it helps students become aware of the social forces at work in the world (Davies & Barnett 2015). N.A. Cooke notes that critical thinking helps information users to take a detached position. A critical approach allows a person to adhere to the necessary skepticism and be selective about information, evaluating it as acceptable or unacceptable (Cook, 2017).

According to the definition of meaning in the Cambridge Dictionary, “Fake News” are “false stories that appear to be news, are spread on the Internet or through other media, usually created to influence political views or as a joke” (Fake News, 2020). However, the Fake News phenomenon has existed under various names for hundreds if not thousands of years. Fake News includes existing approaches and strategies for delegitimate information: political propaganda and disinformation, rumors, parody, satire.

The modern era is called “post-truth”. The word of 2016 became “post-truth” as a term “referring to circumstances in which objective facts have less influence on the formation of public opinion than appealing to or denoting emotions and personal beliefs” (Post-truth. 2021). Mikhailidis & Viotti proposed the term “Post-Fact” Society is a “post-fact” society (Mihailidis, 2017). Mihailidis & Viotty argued that the digital environment combined with Internet users' habits of information search, contributes to the impact, pushing technological manipulations on Internet users. This circumstance also makes it difficult for them to access dependable, factual and up-to-date information.

Safina, et al., (2019) show the development of the Internet changes the ways of creating and perceiving artworks, their storage and reproduction. Moreover, works of art function as an object of communication where irony is the predominant rhetoric of their discussion. This circumstance contributes to the fact that cultural artifacts become a means appropriated by ideologies disseminated scaled and supported in the media space.

Kaplan & Henlein proposed the definition of social media as “a group of Internet applications based on the ideological and technological foundations of Web 2.0 and allowing the creation and exchange of user-generated content” (Kaplan, 2010). Social media platforms such as Facebook are structurally different from previous media technologies, which increase the efficiency of their use (Kaplan, 2014). For example, in the 19th century the advent of inexpensive paper and the improvement of printing machines led to a wide distribution of printing newspapers. In the 20th century, the appearance of radio and television led to a significant information expansion of various contents is transmitted to the audience. However, the development of social media has led to the fact that content can be transmitted to users to a broad audience without fact-checking or editorial judgment.

In this regard, the primary way to solve the emerging problems of interaction between people and society and the mass media is to increase the level of literacy of citizens and the development of critical thinking skills (Korzhuev et al., 2001; Ronzhina, 2020; Ponomarev, 2017), which includes training in critical reading of the media. Therefore, media education is one of the priority directions of education development. In the definition of 1984, UNESCO understood media education as “teaching theory and practical skills for mastering modern means of mass communication, considered as part of a specific and autonomous area of knowledge in pedagogical theory and practice” (UNESKO: Media Education, 1984). However, this interpretation reflects part of the problem of media education. For the media education, the socio-political context, the concept of critical thinking, the convergence of various types of literacy in the digital age is of great importance.

The digital environment's impact on learning development is the subject of many studies (Gilyazova, 2020; Perevalov et al., 2020; Tomyuk et al., 2019). Tomyuk, et al., (2019) show that education meets the time challenges and is involved in global digitalization processes. In contrast, digitalization inevitably causes a transformation of the educational environment and students' social situation, which requires scientific understanding, coordination of efforts of scientists and practitioners. There is an emphasis on these points of view that critical thinking can help prevent fake news. Pearson can question the information that a person comes across in the media. This ability is an important tool in the fight against the spread of false content. False information and fake news in the media are not always presented unambiguously.

The complexity and versatility of the Fake news phenomenon in the media space identified the following questions. They appropriate to highlight such aspects of critical thinking as logical skills, indicated in the concept of E. Glazer, and more complex strategies of the logical analysis presented in the works of Olkhovikov (Olkhovikov, 2019; Olkhovikov, 2018), for example. It seems that logical skills are directly related to the information and psychological skills of the individual. The cognitive informational behavior of citizens is associated with a psychological component. In connection with this assumption, the point of view of Nahl seems to be significant. Nahl drew attention to the factor that interferes with the critical understanding of information. Namely, the more information is available to people and the higher the resulting significant load on their search behaviour, the more difficult it is to find reliable and relevant resources (Nahl, 2004). Nahl presented the relevance of the coverage source of a particular topic as the work of “affective filters” in an individual's mind, allowing or rejecting one or another source of information.

An individual's informational search behavior is conditioned by affective, cognitive and sensorimotor levels. It is according to Nahl “A form of purposeful behavior in which people is motivated (affective) to formulate a plan (cognitive) and execute it (sensorimotor)” (Nahl, 2004). Therefore, one of the tasks of social media is to maintain the constant motivation of the individual. Nahl draws attention to a crucial point: motivations and feelings are the main activators of the search and plans and strategies for solving problems are their resulting formulations in the cognitive sphere.

Affective motives or feelings determine the goal and govern the formulation of the individual's cognitive formulations. The affective aspect of decision-making is influenced by needs, preferences, motivation, goals and objectives, relationships, expected results and tangible efforts, uncertainty, self-efficacy, optimism, satisfaction and acceptance of the value system, the demand for a person in the professional sphere. An important role in human behavior in social media space is played by the previous cultural organization of affective goals and motives. Nahl notes that “Cognitive information will become relevant and interesting to the extent that it contributes to achieving the cultural goals of each seeker. Without this emotional support information is of no value to a person” (Nahl, 2004)

The cultural socialization of individuals influences the situation of information search. Nahl called them “culturally structured motivational components” (Nahl, 2004). This circumstance creates the need to search the information for personal reasons. Personal reasons are the “affective filters” of the human user. These filters set up not to miss important information or miss everything that seems insufficiently relevant for the searcher to determine the topic area. Human behavior in the media sphere depends on the user's subjective experience. Upbringing, and preferences. Subjective experience significantly impacts the organization of goals and motives determined mainly by the affective sphere of human consciousness. Information is relevant and exciting for the user to the extent that it realizes the user's interest. In the terminology of Nahl, information is relevant to the culturally effective goals of each seeker. Without emotional support, information is of no value to a person.

Sundar, like Nahl, notes the importance of the communication moment in the issue of information retrieval (Sunda, 2016). Sundar suggests referring to the situation of viewing the Facebook news feed and notes that if we see what a friend shared on pages then in fact a chain of five sources arises: newspaper politician. Twitter friend and Facebook (Sunda, 2016). As users of Facebook (or another social network) persons have inherent confidence in friends as dependable (sufficient) sources of information. Communication in social networks gives a “false sense of security” in which we are less likely to doubt the information in front of us and check it. Furthermore, Digital technologies facilitate the development of homogeneous networks in which groups of like-minded people are formed that reinforce shared values. In current conditions, citizens have easy ways to share their opinions and value with them. They are very likely to do so and receive feedback from friends through reposts and likes.

Learning Technologies in the Development of Creative Thinking in Students

The critical attitude of teachers to information in the media space their ability to analyze information allows organizing the teaching process and instils in students the ability to work with information. In the modern world, one of the dominant tendencies is the combination of educational and information technologies. The development of education based on Internet technologies is especially significant in the current conditions of widespread e-learning (Blum, 2016; Eaton, 2020a). The emergence of integrated learning technologies allows the teacher to instantly check the effectiveness of the assimilation of the taught material. There is instant feedback between the student and the computer program that tests this knowledge.

Various socio-humanitarian disciplines are aimed at developing critical thinking in students. Socio-humanitarian training allows students to adequately perceive information and resist the manipulative ups and downs of Fake information. At the same time, the formation of various groups of skills and abilities of media competence requires teachers of various academic disciplines. Teachers must have a specific set of skills and abilities that would help students develop the following abilities: to distinguish between different genres of media text analyze media texts in cultural cognitive, ideological, stylistic and other codes plan and create their own media texts.

Let us consider some of the features of the disciplines implementation which objectivity is developing students' critical thinking when interacting with the media sphere. In these disciplines theoretical and practical management theory and decision-making issues uncertainty and risks of decision-making epistemological and socio-philosophical prerequisites for management are considered. The applied aspects of decision-making in the theories of the information society risk society and knowledge society are directly related to the development of student's analytical creative and emotional intelligence. Within the framework of these disciplines discussion practices are proposed based following methods:

• The tasks set;

• Discussion of the read texts;

• Viewing the training and informative video;

• Role-playing games;

• Creation and presentation of presentations and other methods.

Learning assignments in the development of creative thinking or management can be used as experimental learning activities to develop critical thinking in higher education disciplines. The experience of completing practical tasks in the form of discussions creating and playing situations and related actions for reflection can be a unique way to increase the level of critical thinking without explicitly encouraging students to study and develop their intelligence.

The teachers who took part in the survey showed that they are disposed to critical perception and assessment of information. In implementing these disciplines, a wide range of methods and students use techniques that contribute to developing emotional intelligence and the study of educational literature and reading articles. One of the ways to promote the active involvement of students in the learning process is to create a structure for conducting a lesson which includes:

Introductory Part: The studied material is problematized (a case from a watched program. an event from public life. which in the future allow coming to the content of a lecture or seminar) and a positive-emotional background is created.

The Central Part: The most common activities include role-playing exercises written reflection tasks creating a discussion field with 360-degree feedback case studies video demonstration and discussion.
The Final Part: Conclusions are drawn. and reflection is carried out including the actualization of value concepts and a retrospective assessment of the emotional component (emotional attitude to the discussed and studied material) and the semantic component.

The development of students' critical thinking forms important qualities of a competitive personality such as working in a team self-control social stability criticality creativity and comprehending the object under study from different sides of its existence. Increasing motivation to study particular subjects and a better understanding of the material of the studied disciplines is based on methods of active inclusion of students in the learning process. This idea explicitly or implicitly contributes to developing their emotional intelligence and a critical attitude to the information.

In universities, the implementation of disciplines to develop students' communicative competence allows them to form a critical understanding of the meta-structure of the existing theory and practice of industrial activity. It allows students to find a basis for the possibility of a creative approach in solving multi-level problems. Students acquire knowledge that acts as schemes in meta-structure. This method references system that allows forming a holistic understanding of a problem situation and going beyond established algorithms for solving problems.

Interaction of University Teachers with Information in the Media Space and Attitudes towards Fake News

This study is devoted to identifying the features of the interaction of university teachers with information in the media space and attitudes towards Fake news. The study involved 76 teachers of various age categories among whom 50% were women and 50% were men.

When asked about the importance of the topic “Fake news” for teachers the following answers were received:

• 8% of answers – “Very Important”

• 54% of answers – “Important”

• 30% of answers – “Neutral”

• 8% of answers – “Not Important”

Note that the answer “very important” was received from teachers in the age category from 64 to 75 years old.

The question “Where teachers encounter Fake news?” has the following answers:

• The overwhelming majority of respondents chose social media, television, newspapers and magazines – 54%.

• 16% of respondents noted only social media.

• 30% chose social media and television.

• Note that the answer which included the choice of only “social media” (16% of the respondents). was received from teachers in the 25-34 age group.

The question “Do you consider yourself susceptible to Fake news as a teacher/scientist?” has the following answers:

• 60% of the respondents answered. “Rather no”

• 40% answered “no”

For clarifying the teacher's behavior in the media sphere a question was asked about whether teachers have accounts on social networks. Most of the teachers mentioned that they have social media accounts:

• 30% of respondents answered that only on Facebook

• 30% of respondents answered “Vkontakte and Facebook”

• 20% of respondents answered “Instagram. Facebook”

• 12% of respondents answered “Vkontakte. Instagram. Facebook”

• 8% of teachers do not have social media accounts. with one respondent in the 25-34 age group and the other in the 64-75 age group.

Two people answered that they did not have accounts on social networks. Instead, both of them wrote that they use e-mail for communication and they are looking for information on the Internet by asking a question in the search bar.

The question about the goals that teachers pursue using the account has the following answers:

• 40% of respondents chose the answers “for communication”. “for information search”. “for entertainment”;

• 30% of the respondents noted the answer “for information search”. 30% of the respondents noted “communication”.

The question “How often do you use your account?” has the following answers:

• 15% of respondents answered “every day more than 5 hours” (this answer was typical for teachers in the 25-34 age group).

• 45% of respondents chose the answer “Every day less than 1 hour”.

• 40% of respondents chose the answer is “several times a week”.

The question “Do you trust the information and/or news that your friends and/or colleagues share in social networks (Facebook, Instagram, Odnoklassniki and other social networks)” has the following answers:

• 60% of respondents chose the answer “rather yes”.

• 40% of respondents chose the answer “probably not”.

The answer “rather no” was typical for male teachers aged 45 to 54 and teachers of both sexes aged 64 to 75 years.

The question “If information and/or news that your friends and/or colleagues share in social networks (non-personal information for example birthday September 1 with a child) interests you will you check it?” received the following answers:

• “Yes” was answered by 40% of the respondents

• “Rather yes” – 45% of the respondents

• “Rather no” – 10% of the respondents

• “No” – 5% of the respondents

The question “Where do you get the most useful and interesting information for teaching disciplines?” showed the following results:

• 90% of the interviewed teachers refer to scientific literature (books. articles) in Russian and English.

• 67% of the respondents noted that reference to sources in English prevails (simultaneously. most teachers noted that the source of information in English is the Internet: three people noted that they turn not only to Internet sources but also to print publications in English).

• 10% of teachers refer only to Russian sources making equal use of the university library and the Internet.

• 13% of the teachers surveyed consider television to be the source of valuable and exciting information.

• 15% of teachers recognized colleagues and friends as a source of valuable and exciting information.

• The question “Determine the positive and negative factors of the influence of media on a person in the learning process” has the following answers:

• 100% teachers answered that the positive factors are complete access to knowledge access to developmental courses on training platforms access to information and analytical sources.

• 100% teachers answered that negative factors are inaccurate information on the Internet distorting the facts overloading with advertising information and promoting bad habits. • Five teachers in the “Other” column added. “Propagation of a parasitic lifestyle”.

• The question “Are you focused on developing a critical attitude of students to information in the teaching process” received the overwhelming answer “yes”.

• The following answers were received to the question. “Can the students themselves learn to be critical of information”:

• 15% answered – “yes, students can cope with this task on their own”.

• 30% answered that “no. students will not be able to cope with this task on their own. Training is needed”.

• 55% of teachers answered that “students can cope with this task. but training will allow them to cope with this task faster and more efficiently”.

The empirical data presented provide an extremely valuable toolkit for studying the subjective measurement of educational reality. Generalization and designation of the characteristics of teachers' answers allow formulating several methodological and practical conclusions. As a result of the analysis of the responses received due to the questionnaire. we can assume that university teachers are tuned in to critical perception and assessment of information. Teachers are motivated to develop critical thinking in students. It can be concluded that there is a generally critical attitude towards Fake news and informational content in social media. Most educators lack confidence in the information shared by social media users. Teachers themselves are active Internet users. However, they turn to specialized platforms that allow access to scientific information. Teachers do not consider information disseminated on social networks as sufficient sources of information. This circumstance allows concluding that they have no “false sense of security” and doubts about the information. The responses show that most educators view social media as a communication or information tool and critically assess the reliability and accessibility of social media information.

Methodologically, the analysis of teachers' subjective ideas about a media space is how the content is organized. The criteria for its legitimacy or reliability entail an idea of how the learning process works. At the same time, it is difficult to say unequivocally that the manifested understanding of the essence and complexity of media content gives a detailed picture of how teachers organize teaching students. The interaction of students and teachers with media content is not the same; sociocultural conditions influence it. The same event for a teacher can become a source of critical reflection but not interest students. Therefore, one of the teacher's tasks is to transform a reflection into the content component of the taught disciplines.

Conclusion

The theoretical and empirical study of interaction conditions between a person and information in the media sphere leads to several conclusions. The development of the logical informational and psychological aspects of critical thinking can contribute to how a person searches for relevant information. Critically perceives and evaluates it. Moreover, people can resist the manipulative influence of the media.

The data obtained from the study of the attitude of teachers to the information content of the media sphere show a predominant critical attitude in assessing the reliability and availability of information on social networking platforms. As a result of the study, we define critical thinking to analyse information (problems. situations) and the cognitive procedures involved. This result is essential for personality traits that develop students' critical thinking.

For development a critical attitude to information in the media spheres. the teacher needs to focus on those skills and abilities of the student that affect the quality of professional realization and life:

• The ability to analyze the elements of reasoning, since they form the reasoning itself and provide the general logic of thought.

• The ability to evaluate reasoning using the criteria of clarity, accuracy, relevance, consistency, significance, including the moral and ethical component.

• The ability to be “flexible”. That is to navigate in the world of another culture and social order.

• The skill of subject writing using critical thinking tools as a learning tool.

• The ability to consider and analyze information from different points of view.

• The ability to generate questions. Which requires the inclusion of practical strategies for the development of questioning minds in the pedagogical process?

• The ability to think within the logic of a field or discipline.

• The ability of the mind for self-control and introspection.

Education, which includes the predominant communication of teachers and students, contributes to developing the student's critical thinking, emotional intelligence, and creativity. Communicative forms of learning, such as, for example, seminars, discussions, brainstorming, discussions, lead to the fact that the student takes an active part in the learning process, has self-control and greater awareness, increased motivation and a better understanding of the material of the studied disciplines.

Acknowledgement

The reported study was funded by RFBR, project number 20-013-00813 «Educational potential of the media sphere as a space for the development of legal culture and human rights culture in modern Russia» This research was supported by TPU development program.

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