An experiment conducted with 610 participants suggests that corrections to misinformation – pointing out information that is wrong or misleading and offering credible information in its place – on social media reduce misperceptions regardless of the correction’s tone (uncivil, affirmational, or neutral). There is also an opportunity to correct secondary but related misperceptions (dealing with the same topic but with a different specific fact) when responding to misinformation on social media. Our findings emphasize that correction on social media could operate as part of a broader strategy to reduce beliefs in misinformation, and users should be encouraged to bring additional relevant information into the conversation
{"title":"Do the right thing: Tone may not affect correction of misinformation on social media","authors":"L. Bode, E. Vraga, M. Tully","doi":"10.37016/mr-2020-026","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.37016/mr-2020-026","url":null,"abstract":"An experiment conducted with 610 participants suggests that corrections to misinformation – pointing out information that is wrong or misleading and offering credible information in its place – on social media reduce misperceptions regardless of the correction’s tone (uncivil, affirmational, or neutral). There is also an opportunity to correct secondary but related misperceptions (dealing with the same topic but with a different specific fact) when responding to misinformation on social media. Our findings emphasize that correction on social media could operate as part of a broader strategy to reduce beliefs in misinformation, and users should be encouraged to bring additional relevant information into the conversation","PeriodicalId":93289,"journal":{"name":"Harvard Kennedy School misinformation review","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-06-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44068097","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
To gain insight into how Chinese state media is communicating about the coronavirus pandemic to the outside world, we analyzed a collection of posts from their English-language presence on Facebook. We observed three recurring behaviors: sharing positive stories and promoting the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) pandemic response, rewriting recent history in a manner favorable to the CCP as the coronavirus pandemic evolved, and using targeted ads to spread preferred messages. Although spin is not unique to state actors, paid ad campaigns to promote government-run state media pages containing misinformation and conspiracies are problematic. Our findings suggest that platforms should implement clearer disclosure of state-sponsored communications at a minimum, and consider refusing paid posts from such entities.
{"title":"Pandemics & Propaganda: How Chinese State Media Creates and Propagates CCP Coronavirus Narratives","authors":"Vanessa Molter, Renée DiResta","doi":"10.37016/mr-2020-025","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.37016/mr-2020-025","url":null,"abstract":"To gain insight into how Chinese state media is communicating about the coronavirus pandemic to the outside world, we analyzed a collection of posts from their English-language presence on Facebook. We observed three recurring behaviors: sharing positive stories and promoting the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) pandemic response, rewriting recent history in a manner favorable to the CCP as the coronavirus pandemic evolved, and using targeted ads to spread preferred messages. Although spin is not unique to state actors, paid ad campaigns to promote government-run state media pages containing misinformation and conspiracies are problematic. Our findings suggest that platforms should implement clearer disclosure of state-sponsored communications at a minimum, and consider refusing paid posts from such entities.","PeriodicalId":93289,"journal":{"name":"Harvard Kennedy School misinformation review","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-06-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49036880","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Katherine Ognyanova, D. Lazer, Ronald E. Robertson, Christo Wilson
{"title":"Misinformation in action: Fake news exposure\u0000is linked to lower trust in media, higher trust in government when your side is in power","authors":"Katherine Ognyanova, D. Lazer, Ronald E. Robertson, Christo Wilson","doi":"10.37016/mr-2020-024","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.37016/mr-2020-024","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":93289,"journal":{"name":"Harvard Kennedy School misinformation review","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-06-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43229360","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}