A study evaluated the preference-based account by comparing the perceived importance of accuracy to other factors. The majority of participants rated accuracy as "extremely important" in their sharing behaviors. They also rated accuracy as higher in priority than all other dimensions provided by the study. This suggests that the preference-based account does not sufficiently describe misinformation sharing.

Preference-Based Account and Sharing Discernment

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

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

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

Theories of Social Media Misinformation Sharing

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

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

Preference-Based Account of Social Media Misinformation Sharing

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

Inattention-Based Account of Misinformation

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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