Less than half of people in Ireland trust the Government, a new survey has found.
The study from the Central Statistics Office (CSO) finds more than eight-in-10 respondents (83%) reported they trust 'most people'.
Political parties had the lowest levels of trust with approximately one-in-four people reporting they trust them.
Seven-in-10 people say they trust the Gardaí and close to half (47%) report they trust the news media.
Results of the CSO Trust survey. Source: CSOPsychotherapist Stella O'Malley told Newstalk Breakfast people's attitudes have changed due to social media.
"I think the lack of faith people have in the Government and in the institutions is quite revealing," she said.
"It is reflected when you speak to people - you realise there's been a kind of distinct change in our attitudes."
A man looks at an iPhone which displays the TikTok logo. Image: M4OS Photos / AlamyMs O'Malley said she believes people are confusing curated content on platforms like TikTok for news.
"When I work with young people, they're getting their news from TikTok, and it's very curated," she said.
"That's not actually the news, I might say, because I'm of a different generation and they're like, 'Oh no I saw it on TikTok'.
"Arguably in the last 10 years there's been a big shift maybe with Donald Trump and the 'fake news' era.
"At the same time social media arrived and started producing content which is very news-focused but wrapped up in entertainment."
The COVID effect
Ms O'Malley said the COVID-19 pandemic also saw another paradigm shift where people "started to significantly lose trust in what the Government were saying, what the news outlets were saying... and seeing it more as opinion".
"I think that has really shaped people's attitudes".
She said different rules and approaches by various countries meant "news is depending on who is delivering it".
"It was destabilising for people who wanted a solid ground that they could just look to the governmental institutions... for definitive facts," she said.
"It feels like that solid ground has been destabilised".
'Social media is winning'
Ms O'Malley said it is in the interest of social media companies to be more appealing to users.
"It's within their business model to make sure that their business model is more believable than the governmental one," she said.
"I feel like social media as an entity is winning - the algorithm is shaped to each person's bias.
"It's so easy to keep on pressing and you end up really quite deep into place quite quickly.
"Every single algorithm is individualised; it's frightening how much we're being shaped."
Ms O'Malley added that people are "completely believing what we want to believe - which is the social media feed - rather than the neutral news that has been given out".
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