Resources Repository
-
ArticlePublication 2021COVID-19 Infodemic: Applying the Epidemiologic Model to Counter Misinformation
Throughout the world, including the U.S., medical professionals and patients are facing both a pandemic …
Throughout the world, including the U.S., medical professionals and patients are facing both a pandemic and an infodemic – the first caused by SARS-CoV-2 and the second by misinformation and disinformation. The Annenberg Public Policy Center’s tracking of social and legacy media has found that millions of people have been exposed to deceptive material alleging that SARS-CoV-2 is a hoax or that experts are exaggerating its severity and the extent of its spread, that masks…
Preferences/Values | Decision Psychology | Science/Technology | Social Determinants | Infectious Diseases | Culture/Society | Health/Medicine | North America -
ArticlePublication 2019Countering Misinformation with Lessons from Public Health
The internet is often praised as a tool for freedom of speech, democracy, and truth. …
The internet is often praised as a tool for freedom of speech, democracy, and truth. However, the internet increasingly has become polluted by misinformation – the inadvertent spread of misleading and false information – and disinformation – the deliberate and coordinated spread of misleading and false information. Individuals online knowingly and unknowingly spread dangerous rumors and propaganda at an alarming rate, which can mislead or manipulate the worldview of those who encounter it. False information…
Preferences/Values | Decision Psychology | Science/Technology | Social Determinants | Infectious Diseases | Child/Nutrition | Culture/Society | Health/Medicine | Global | North America -
ArticlePublication 2020Conspiracy Theories as Barriers to Controlling the Spread of COVID-19 in the U.S.
This article uses national probability survey data of U.S. adults to assess the relationship between …
This article uses national probability survey data of U.S. adults to assess the relationship between belief in three COVID-19-related conspiracy theories to adoption of preventive measures recommended by public health authorities, vaccination intentions, conspiracy beliefs, perceptions of threat, belief about the safety of vaccines, political ideology, and media exposure patterns. Authors found that conspiracy theory beliefs were highly stable across two periods of the survey and inversely related to the (1) perceived threat of the…
Preferences/Values | Decision Psychology | Science/Technology | Social Determinants | Infectious Diseases | Culture/Society | Government/Law | Health/Medicine | North America -
ArticlePublication 2020New Fronts in the War on Misinformation
The countless false claims that have spread alongside the novel coronavirus – inaccurate advice about …
The countless false claims that have spread alongside the novel coronavirus – inaccurate advice about how to prevent the virus, for example, and conspiracy theories about its origins – are just the latest manifestation of an ongoing problem: the online proliferation of misinformation about science and health. The National Academies hosted and helped organize three events focused on countering misinformation: The MisinfoCon conference, a Wikipedia Edit-a-thon, and a meeting to explore ways to expand successful…
Preferences/Values | Decision Psychology | Science/Technology | Social Determinants | Infectious Diseases | Policy/Regulation | Culture/Society | Education/Labor | Government/Law | Health/Medicine | North America -
ArticlePublication 2021Rational Policymaking during a Pandemic
Policymaking during a pandemic can be extremely challenging. As COVID-19 is a new disease and …
Policymaking during a pandemic can be extremely challenging. As COVID-19 is a new disease and its global impacts are unprecedented, decisions are taken in a highly uncertain, complex, and rapidly changing environment. In such a context, in which human lives and the economy are at stake, the authors argue that using ideas and constructs from modern decision theory, even informally, will make policymaking a more responsible and transparent process.
Priority Setting/Ethics | Decision Theory | Science/Technology | Infectious Diseases | Policy/Regulation | Government/Law | Health/Medicine | Global -
ArticlePublication 2021Identifying Credible Sources of Health Information in Social Media: Principles and Attributes
Social media is widely used as a source of health information for the general public. …
Social media is widely used as a source of health information for the general public. The potential for information shared through social media to influence health outcomes necessitates action by social media platforms to enhance access and exposure to high-quality, science-based information. This paper summarizes the work of an independent advisory group convened by the National Academy of Medicine that deliberated and gathered information to develop a set of initial principles and attributes that could…
Preferences/Values | Decision Psychology | Science/Technology | Social Determinants | Policy/Regulation | Culture/Society | Education/Labor | Health/Medicine | North America -
ArticlePublication 2021Why the Backfire Effect Does Not Explain the Durability of Political Misperceptions
Previous research indicated that corrective information can sometimes provoke a so-called “backfire effect” in which …
Previous research indicated that corrective information can sometimes provoke a so-called “backfire effect” in which respondents more strongly endorsed a misperception about a controversial political or scientific issue when their beliefs or predispositions were challenged. This article shows how subsequent research and media coverage seized on this finding, distorting its generality and exaggerating its role relative to other factors in explaining the durability of political misperceptions. To the contrary, an emerging research consensus finds that…
Preferences/Values | Decision Psychology | Science/Technology | Social Determinants | Culture/Society | Government/Law | Health/Medicine | North America -
ArticlePublication 2021Scientific Theory of Gist Communication and Misinformation Resistance
This article presents a framework for understanding how misinformation shapes decision-making, which has cognitive representations …
This article presents a framework for understanding how misinformation shapes decision-making, which has cognitive representations of gist at its core. The author discusses how the framework goes beyond prior work, and how it can be implemented so that valid scientific messages are more likely to be effective, remembered, and shared through social media, while misinformation is resisted. The distinction between mental representations of the rote facts of a message – its verbatim representation – and…
Preferences/Values | Decision Psychology | Science/Technology | Social Determinants | Policy/Regulation | Culture/Society | Health/Medicine | North America -
ArticlePublication 2021Narrative Truth About Scientific Misinformation
Science and storytelling mean different things when they speak of truth. This difference leads some …
Science and storytelling mean different things when they speak of truth. This difference leads some to blame storytelling for presenting a distorted view of science and contributing to misinformation. Yet others celebrate storytelling as a way to engage audiences and share accurate scientific information. This review disentangles the complexities of how storytelling intersects with scientific misinformation. Storytelling is the act of sharing a narrative, and science and narrative represent two distinct ways of constructing reality.…
Preferences/Values | Decision Psychology | Science/Technology | Social Determinants | Culture/Society | Health/Medicine | Global | North America