User:Hanmarnel11/Misinformation

Article Draft
Lead:

Misinformation is incorrect or misleading information presented as fact, either intentionally or unintentionally. Disinformation is a subset of misinformation, that which is deliberately deceptive. Rumors are information not attributed to any particular source, and so are unreliable and often unverified, but can turn out to be either true or false. Even if later retracted, misinformation can continue to influence actions and memory. People may be more prone to believe misinformation because they are emotionally connected to what they are hearing or reading. The role of social media has made information readily available to us at anytime and it connects vast groups of people along with their information at one time. Advances in technology has impacted the way we communicate information and the way misinformation is spread. Misinformation has impacts on our societies ability to receive information which then influences our communities, politics, and medical field.

Rumors are information not attributed to any particular source, and so are unreliable and often unverified, but can turn out to be either true or false. Even if later retracted, misinformation can continue to influence actions and memory. Advances in technology has impacted the way we communicate information and the way misinformation is spread.

Prior research suggests it can be difficult to undo the effects of misinformation once individuals believe it to be true, and that fact-checking can backfire. Individuals may desire to reach a certain conclusion, causing them to accept information that supports that conclusion. This is known as motivated reasoning. Added: "Individuals are more likely to hang onto information and share information if it emotionally resonates with them".

Individuals create mental models and schemas to understand their physical and social environments. Misinformation that becomes incorporated into a mental model, especially for long periods of time, will be more difficult to address as individuals prefer to have a complete mental model. In this instance, it is necessary to correct the misinformation by both refuting it and providing accurate information that can function in the mental model. When attempting to correct misinformation, it is important to consider previous research which has identified effective and ineffective strategies. Simply providing the corrected information is insufficient to correct the effects of misinformation, and it may even have a negative effect. Due to the familiarity heuristic, information that is familiar is more likely to be believed to be true—corrective messages which contain a repetition of the original misinformation may result in an increase in familiarity and cause a backfire effect. Misinformation

Misinformation can affect all aspects of life. Allcott, Gentzkow, and Yu concur that the diffusion of misinformation through social media is a potential threat to democracy and broader society. The effects of misinformation can lead to decline of accuracy of information as well as event details. When eavesdropping on conversations, one can gather facts that may not always be true, or the receiver may hear the message incorrectly and spread the information to others. On the Internet, one can read content that is stated to be factual but that may not have been checked or may be erroneous. In the news, companies may emphasize the speed at which they receive and send information but may not always be correct in the facts. These developments contribute to the way misinformation may continue to complicate the public's understanding of issues and to serve as a source for belief and attitude formation. The Novelty Hypothesis, which was created by Soroush Vosoughi, Added: Deb Roy and Sinan Aral when they wanted to learn more about what attracts people to false news. What they discovered was that people are connected through emotion. In their study, they compared false tweets on Twitter that were shared by the total content tweeted, they specifically looked at the users and both the false and true information they shared. They learned that people are connected through their emotions, false rumors suggested more surprise and disgust which got people hooked and that the true rumors attracted more sadness, joy and trust. This study showed which emotions are more likely to cause the spread of false news. Misinformation

Another reason that misinformation spreads on social media is from the users themselves. In a study, it was shown that the most common reasons that Facebook users were sharing misinformation for socially-motivated reasons, rather than taking the information seriously. Although users may not be spreading false information for malicious reasons, the misinformation is still being spread. A research study shows that misinformation introduced through a social format influences individuals drastically more than misinformation delivered non-socially. Facebook's coverage of misinformation has become a hot topic with the spread of COVID-19, as some reports indicated Facebook recommended pages containing health misinformation. For example, this can be seen when a user likes an anti-vax Facebook page. Automatically, more and more anti-vax pages are recommended to the user. Additionally, some reference Facebook's inconsistent censorship of misinformation leading to deaths from COVID-19. Larry Cook, the creator of the "Stop Mandatory Vaccination" organization made money posting anti-vax false news on social media. He posted more than 150 posts aimed towards woman had over 1.6 million views and earned money on every click and share. Misinformation. *Should we take out the sentence on COVID deaths?

In regards to politics, some view being a misinformed citizen as worse than being an uninformed citizen. Misinformed citizens can state their beliefs and opinions with confidence and thus affect elections and policies. This type of misinformation occurs when a speaker appears "authoritative and legitimate", while also spreading misinformation. When information is presented as vague, ambiguous, sarcastic, or partial, receivers are forced to piece the information together and make assumptions about what is correct. Misinformation has the power to sway public elections and referendums if it gains enough momentum. Leading up to the 2016 United Kingdom European Union membership referendum, for example, a figure widely circulated by the Vote Leave campaign claimed the UK would save £350 million a week by leaving the EU, and that the money would be redistributed to the British National Health Service. This was later deemed a "clear misuse of official statistics" by the UK statistics authority. The advert infamously shown on the side of London's double-decker busses did not take into account the UK's budget rebate, and the idea that 100% of the money saved would go to the NHS was unrealistic. A poll published in 2016 by Ipsos MORI found that nearly half of the British public believed this misinformation to be true. Even when information is proven to be misinformation, it may continue to shape attitudes towards a given topic, meaning it has the power to swing political decisions if it gains enough traction. A study conducted by Soroush Vosoughi, Deb Roy and Sinan Aral looked at Twitter data including 126,000 posts spread by 3 million people over 4.5 million times. They found that political news traveled faster than any other type of information. They found that false news about politics reached more than 20,000 people three times faster than all other types of false news. Misinformation

Digital and social media can contribute to the spread of misinformation when users share information without first checking the legitimacy of the information they have found. People are more likely to encounter online information based on personalized algorithms. Google, Facebook and Yahoo News all generate newsfeed based on the information it knows about our devices, our location, and our online interests. Although two people can search for the same thing at the same time, they are very likely to get different results based on what that platform deems relevant to their interests, fact or false. Misinformation Added the Peer Review image.