Resources Repository
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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…
Decision Psychology | Education/Labor | Culture/Society | Policy/Regulation | Social Determinants | Preferences/Values | Health/Medicine | Science/Technology | North America -
ArticlePublication 2021COVID-19, Fake News, and Vaccines: Should Regulation Be Implemented?
This article analyzes issues concerning the establishment of compulsory vaccination against COVID-19, as well as …
This article analyzes issues concerning the establishment of compulsory vaccination against COVID-19, as well as the role of misinformation as a disincentive – especially when published by health professionals – and citizen acceptance of measures in this regard. Data from different surveys revealed a high degree of hesitation rather than outright opposition to vaccines. The most frequent complaint related to the COVID-19 vaccination was the fear of side effects. Within the Spanish and European legislative…
Decision Psychology | Education/Labor | Culture/Society | Policy/Regulation | Social Determinants | Preferences/Values | Infectious Diseases | Government/Law | Health/Medicine | Science/Technology | Global -
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…
Decision Psychology | Education/Labor | Culture/Society | Policy/Regulation | Social Determinants | Preferences/Values | Infectious Diseases | Government/Law | Health/Medicine | Science/Technology | 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…
Decision Psychology | Culture/Society | Policy/Regulation | Social Determinants | Preferences/Values | Health/Medicine | Science/Technology | North America -
ArticlePublication 2021Misinformation and Public Opinion of Science and Health
This article summarizes the literature on misinformation, beginning with an overview of the most common …
This article summarizes the literature on misinformation, beginning with an overview of the most common definitions of misinformation (and related terms) in the communication literature and then a review of academic studies in the areas of science and health. The author acknowledges four overarching questions that have emerged prominently in recent years: (1) What does “misinformation” (and the terms that are oftentimes treated synonymously) mean? (2) How big of a problem is it in areas…
Decision Psychology | Education/Labor | Culture/Society | Social Determinants | Preferences/Values | Climate/Environment | Energy/Engineering | Science/Technology | Global | North America -
ArticlePublication 2021Measuring the News and Its Impact on Democracy
Since the 2016 U.S. presidential election, the deliberate spread of misinformation online, and on social …
Since the 2016 U.S. presidential election, the deliberate spread of misinformation online, and on social media in particular, has generated extraordinary concern, in large part because of its potential effects on public opinion, political polarization, and ultimately democratic decision making. Recently, however, some have argued that both the prevalence and consumption of “fake news” per se is extremely low compared with other types of news and news-relevant content. Although neither prevalence nor consumption is a…
Decision Psychology | Culture/Society | Policy/Regulation | Social Determinants | Preferences/Values | Science/Technology | North America -
ArticlePublication 2021National Academies Work Helps Foster an Evidence-Based Information Environment
U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy issued a public advisory on health misinformation, calling it a …
U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy issued a public advisory on health misinformation, calling it a “serious threat to public health” and encouraging all Americans to help slow its spread during the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond. To that end, the National Academies have been addressing misinformation in health and science on multiple fronts and are taking steps to help cultivate a fact- and evidence-based information environment. This description was extracted from the article.
Decision Psychology | Culture/Society | Policy/Regulation | Social Determinants | Preferences/Values | Infectious Diseases | Health/Medicine | Science/Technology | North America -
ReviewPublication 2021European News Consumers' Perceptions of Misinformation
This study indicated that news users across ten different European countries are quite concerned about …
This study indicated that news users across ten different European countries are quite concerned about misinformation in their information environment. Respondents were most likely to associate politicians, corporations, and foreign actors with misinformation. They perceived misinformation to be most common for topics like immigration, the economy, and the environment. This offered support for the increasingly more relative and politicized status of facts in people’s credibility perceptions. Yet, differences across sources and issues were relatively modest,…
Decision Psychology | Education/Labor | Culture/Society | Social Determinants | Preferences/Values | Health/Medicine | Science/Technology | Europe -
ArticlePublication 2020Online Competition between Pro- and Anti-Vaccination Views
Distrust in scientific expertise is dangerous. Opposition to vaccination with a future vaccine against SARS-CoV-2, …
Distrust in scientific expertise is dangerous. Opposition to vaccination with a future vaccine against SARS-CoV-2, the causal agent of COVID-19, for example, could amplify outbreaks as happened for measles in 2019. Homemade remedies and falsehoods are being shared widely on the Internet, as well as dismissals of expert advice. There is a lack of understanding about how this distrust evolves at the system level. Authors provide a map of the contention surrounding vaccines that has…
Decision Psychology | Culture/Society | Policy/Regulation | Social Determinants | Preferences/Values | Infectious Diseases | Health Systems | Government/Law | Health/Medicine | Science/Technology | North America