On the Efficacy of Accuracy Prompts Across Partisan Lines: An Adversarial Collaboration

Martel, Cameron; Rathje, Steve; Clark, Cory J.; Pennycook, Gordon; Van Bavel, Jay J.; Rand, David G.; van der Linden, Sander

doi:10.1177/09567976241232905

Cited by 5 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 50 publications

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“…While all these approaches can work, there is evidence that interventions may not be equally useful for all individuals. For example, while attention-focusing interventions are generally seen as effective, there have been suggestions that they may be less so for some individuals with right-wing political views [12,13]. Beyond characteristics such as political orientation, the motives of individuals spreading false information are likely to be important.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Individual differences in sharing false political information on social media: Deliberate and accidental sharing, motivations and positive schizotypy

Buchanan,

Perach,

Husbands

et al. 2024

PLoS ONE

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False political information–misinformation or disinformation—is widely spread on social media. Individual social media users play a large part in this. However, only a minority actively share false material. It is important to establish what sets these individuals apart from those who do not, and why they do it. Motivations for sharing may vary and are likely to differ between people who share false material unknowingly and on purpose. In this paper we consider the extent to which individual differences in personality and other variables, and motivations for sharing, are associated with the likelihood of people sharing false political information both accidentally and deliberately. In a series of four studies (Ns = 614, 563, 627, 113) we examined predictors of sharing false political information using different methodological approaches. Across the four studies, a key finding was that positive schizotypy is associated with measures of sharing false information both accidentally and deliberately. Motivations for sharing political information online were also relevant, with sharing for reasons of ’raising awareness’ appearing particularly important. Implications for research and practice are discussed.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Individual differences in sharing false political information on social media: Deliberate and accidental sharing, motivations and positive schizotypy

Buchanan,

Perach,

Husbands

et al. 2024

PLoS ONE

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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Shoves, nudges and combating misinformation: evidence on a new approach

Porter,

Wood,

Broniatowski

et al. 2024

Behav. Public Policy

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To what extent can the harms of misinformation be mitigated by relying on nudges? Prior research has demonstrated that non-intrusive ‘accuracy nudges’ can reduce the sharing of misinformation. We investigate an alternative approach. Rather than subtly reminding people about accuracy, our intervention, indebted to research on the bystander effect, explicitly appeals to individuals' capacity to help solve the misinformation challenge. Our results are mixed. On the one hand, our intervention reduces the willingness to share and believe in misinformation fact-checked as false. On the other hand, it also reduces participants' willingness to share information that has been fact-checked as true and innocuous, as well as non-fact-checked information. Experiment 1 offers proof of concept; Experiment 2 tests our intervention with a more realistic mix of true and false social media posts; Experiment 3 tests our interventions alongside an accuracy nudge. The effectiveness of our intervention at reducing willingness to share misinformation remains consistent across experiments; meta-analysis reveals that our treatment reduced willingness to share false content across experiments by 20% of a scale point on a six-point scale. We do not observe the accuracy nudge reducing willingness to share false content. Taken together, these results highlight the advantages and disadvantages of accuracy nudges and our more confrontational approach.

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The Psychology of Misinformation Across the Lifespan

Edelson,

Reyna,

Singh

et al. 2024

Annual Review of Developmental Psychology

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Ubiquitous misinformation on social media threatens the health and well-being of young people. We review research on susceptibility to misinformation, why it spreads, and how these mechanisms might operate developmentally. Although we identify many research gaps, results suggest that cognitive ability, thinking styles, and metacognitive scrutiny of misinformation are protective, but early adverse experiences can bias information processing and sow seeds of mistrust. We find that content knowledge is not sufficient to protect against misinformation, but that it, along with life experiences, provides a foundation for gist plausibility (true in principle, rather than true at the level of verbatim details) that likely determines whether misinformation is accepted and shared. Thus, we present a theoretical framework based on fuzzy-trace theory that integrates knowledge that distinguishes verbatim facts from gist (knowledge that is amplified by cognitive faculties and derived from trusted sources); personality as an information-processing filter colored by experiences; emotion as a product of interpreting the gist of information; and ideology that changes prior probabilities and gist interpretations of what is plausible. The young and the old may be at greatest risk because of their prioritization of social goals, a need that social-media algorithms are designed to meet but at the cost of widespread exposure to misinformation.

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On the Efficacy of Accuracy Prompts Across Partisan Lines: An Adversarial Collaboration

Cited by 5 publications

References 50 publications

Individual differences in sharing false political information on social media: Deliberate and accidental sharing, motivations and positive schizotypy

Individual differences in sharing false political information on social media: Deliberate and accidental sharing, motivations and positive schizotypy

Shoves, nudges and combating misinformation: evidence on a new approach

The Psychology of Misinformation Across the Lifespan

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