Pennycook et al. tested the inattention-based account of misinformation sharing as it relates to COVID-19 misinformation. They conducted two studies. The goal of the first study was to find correlations between personal characteristics and the ability to discern true or false headlines under different conditions. The goal of the second study was to see if subtly reminding people to consider accuracy reduced misinformation sharing related to COVID-19. 

Inattention-based misinformation and the COVID-19 Pandemic

Research using eye movements to measure attention found that correcting misinformation about the HPV vaccine with a humorous approach led to more attention being paid both to the approach and to the misinformation prompt, as well as less credibility perceived in the misinformation prompt. Because attention must be present in order to form an opinion of a source's credibility, it is suggested that the increase in attention led to the decrease in credibility perceived in the misinformation prompt, due to re-evaluation. This establishes an indirect connection between humor and misinformation, mediated by attention. 

Attention as a Mediator in Reducing Vaccine Misconceptions

A study in which participants were primed to think about accuracy while choosing whether to share a headline on Facebook showed a significant increase in positive sharing discernment over participants who were not primed. Primed participants were less likely than unprimed participants to share false headlines, and equally likely to share true headlines. A follow-up experiment shared two untrustworthy sources—one accompanied by an accuracy prompt—and found 2.8 times higher levels of positive sharing discernment towards the source accompanied by the accuracy prompt. Results suggest that misinformation sharing is often caused by distraction from the concept of accuracy, especially on social media.

Inattention-Based Account and Sharing Discernment

Misinformation can spread because people are distracted by information other than accuracy. Some of these could include: party alignment, social relevance, or social reinforcement. 

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- The information appears to be true or is believable 
- Being rewritten in different forms
- Being accessible through multiple sources
- Confirmation Bias 
- Authoritative bias 
- Targeting hot topics
- Indicating urgency
- The Sunk Cost Fallacy 
- emotional appeals 
- False Beliefs
- Labels can lead to errors in assessment of information
- False Memories
- Inaccurate evaluation of information
- Ease of Processing
- Underthinking
- Deliberative processes

Reasons Misinformation Spreads

 - Confusion-based account
 - Inattention-based account
 - Preference-based account

Theories of Social Media Misinformation Sharing

Pennycook, G., McPhetres, J., Zhang, Y., Lu, J., & Rand, D. (2020). Fighting COVID-19 Misinformation on Social Media: Experimental Evidence for a Scalable Accuracy-Nudge Intervention. Psychological Science, 31(7), 770-780. https://doi.org/10.1177/0956797620939054

Fighting COVID-19 Misinformation on 
Social Media: Experimental Evidence for 
a Scalable Accuracy-Nudge Intervention

Pennycook, G., Epstein, Z., Mosleh, M., Arechar, A. A., Eckles, D., & Rand, D. G. (2021). Shifting attention to accuracy can reduce misinformation online. Nature, 592(7855), 590–595. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-021-03344-2

Shifting attention to accuracy can reduce misinformation online

Misinformation Gets Attention Through Being Intertwined with Elements of Truth

Misinformation Gets Attention Through Being Rewritten in Different Forms

Misinformation Gets Attention Through Being Accessible Through Multiple Sources

Misinformation Gets Attention Through Targeting Hot Topics

A fallacy where individuals are less likely to give up an investment (financial or emotional) the more time they have put into it. 

The Sunk Cost Fallacy

A bias where individuals are more likely to follow figures of authority/influence. 

Authoritative Bias 

Many aspects of social media make it especially susceptible to the spread of misinformation. 
- Messages are easy to process, therefore easy to believe.
- Credibility is easily established by following friends, who often have similar views (which also establishes compatibility).
- Posts are shared by people you trust, establishes repetition and social consensus.
- Comments and related posts provide supporting evidence and familiarity.
- Users can gain a false sense of expertise, becoming very familiar with one perspective. 
- Lack of opposing ideas on a person’s feed is interpreted as a lack of different ideas overall.


The Susceptibility of Social Media to Misinformation

Errors in one's knowledge system that lead them to believe that an inaccurate piece of information is true.

False Beliefs

Labels can powerfully impact the way one assesses and interacts with information. Some labels have been known to distort perception and cause individuals to jump to inaccurate conclusions or misinterpret information.

The impact of labels on the assessment of information

Inattention-Based Account of Misinformation

A false memory is a recollection of an event, or details of an event, that did not actually occur. This phenomenon highlights that human memory is not a perfect, video-like recording of the past but is instead a reconstructive process capable of creating memories for things that never happened.

False Memories

- Cognitive biases 
- Accuracy of information is not a priority when gaining knowledge 
- The source of information is unknown or unreliable 
- Sources are often listed after the information has already been presented and embedded into one's knowledge base
- Evidence for a piece of information is not relevant  but gives the illusion of support 
- Alternative viewpoints are not considered
- Monitoring the accuracy of information takes great effort
- Working against one's own biases is difficult

Reasons for inaccurate evaluation of information

According to a study conducted by Cheng Zhou, Kai Li, and Yanhong Lu, misinformation containing specific linguistic qualities is more likely to be shared on social media. By examining the content of fake news posts and the number of shares, they found that misinformation containing persuasive and uncertainty words were more likely to be shared than true posts. The effect was moderated by the richness of the information. 

Linguistic Traits of Misinformation Online

During a crisis, social media is used to spread information. Anyone can take part in the spreading of information which can be bad. Trust during a crisis is important and if individuals' social media posts are not regulated or fact-checked like those belonging to an organization or agency misinformation spreads. Rumor's and misinformation can cause panic and lead to resources being spent on false leads.

Social Media is Unregulated: Double-edge Sword 

People are more likely to believe a claim that they have been exposed to repeatedly. Repetition increases the perception of social consensus, even when it is just one person’s account being repeated multiple times. The effect of repetition of messages is so strong that it can sway people who are unsure and even convince people who know it is false to accept it.


Repetition of Information

We are more likely to accept information that is easy to process. 


Ease of Processing

When people accept information intuitively, rather than using systematic reasoning to critically analyze it. Can affect people with lower cognitive ability, people who rely on intuitive thinking, and people in situations which elicit underthinking.


Underthinking

- Negative emotional state vs. positive emotional state
- High arousal conditions vs. low arousal conditions
- The cognitive impact of anger 
- Anger and suggestibility
- Anger's effect on speed and confidence 
- Post-truth situation

Influences of emotion on accepting misinformation

Discourse concerning the role of deliberation in the creation of false beliefs from misinformation has been centered on two main perspectives:
- Motivated System 2 Reasoning (MS2R)
- Classical reasoning

Misinformation: Deliberative Processes

Social media algorithms analyze user behavior and prioritize content the platform believes the user wants to see and is most likely to engage with.

Social Media Algorithm

Defined as the extent to which news, regardless of its accuracy, is believed. Calculated as the average of one's belief in true news and belief in false news

Overall belief in fake news

A motivated reasoning account that posits that deliberation causes individuals to belief information (real or fake) that aligns with their political beliefs. This theory hypothesizes that there is a positive association between analytic thinking and perceived accuracy of headlines that align with one's beliefs. 

Motivated System 2 Reasoning (MS2R)

Confirmation bias is the cognitive tendency to selectively focus on cases that validate our pre-existing intuitive beliefs while actively disregarding or forgetting cases that contradict them. This mental shortcut leads individuals to reinforce incorrect assumptions by ignoring disconfirming evidence.

Confirmation Bias

The confusion-based account of social media misinformation sharing proposes that people share misinformation because they accidentally believe that the misinformation is accurate.

Confusion-Based Account of Social Media Misinformation Sharing

The preference-based account of social media misinformation sharing proposes that people knowingly share misinformation because they care less about accuracy than other factors. 

Preference-Based Account of Social Media Misinformation Sharing

A survey quantifying the relative contribution of the confusion-based, preference-based and inattention-based accounts to the willingness to share false headlines on social media found that the inattention-based account explains 51.2% of sharing, the confusion-based account explains 33.1% of sharing, and the preference-based account explains 15.8% of sharing. 

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