TY - JOUR

T1 - A comparison of prebunking and debunking interventions for implied versus explicit misinformation

AU - Tay, Li

AU - Hurlstone, Mark

AU - Kurz, Tim

AU - Ecker, Ullrich

N1 - This is the peer reviewed version of the following article: Tay, L. Q., Hurlstone, M. J., Kurz, T., & Ecker, U. K. H. (2022). A comparison of prebunking and debunking interventions for implied versus explicit misinformation. British Journal of Psychology, 113, 591– 607. doi: 10.1111/bjop.12551 which has been published in final form at https://bpspsychub.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/bjop.12551 This article may be used for non-commercial purposes in accordance With Wiley Terms and Conditions for self-archiving.

PY - 2022/8/31

Y1 - 2022/8/31

N2 - Psychological research has offered valuable insights into how to combat misinformation. The studies conducted to date, however, have three limitations. First, pre-emptive (“prebunking”) and retroactive (“debunking”) interventions have mostly been examined in parallel, and thus it is unclear which of these two predominant approaches is more effective. Second, there has been a focus on misinformation that is explicitly false, but misinformation that uses literally true information to mislead is common in the real world. Finally, studies have relied mainly on questionnaire measures of reasoning, neglecting behavioural impacts of misinformation and interventions. To offer incremental progress towards addressing these three issues, we conducted an experiment (N = 735) involving misinformation on fair trade. We contrasted the effectiveness of prebunking versus debunking and the impacts of implied versus explicit misinformation, and incorporated novel measures assessing consumer behaviours (i.e., willingness-to-pay; information seeking; online misinformation promotion) in addition to standard questionnaire measures. In general, we found debunking to be more effective than prebunking, although both were able to reduce misinformation reliance. We also found that individuals tended to rely more on explicit than implied misinformation both with and without interventions.

AB - Psychological research has offered valuable insights into how to combat misinformation. The studies conducted to date, however, have three limitations. First, pre-emptive (“prebunking”) and retroactive (“debunking”) interventions have mostly been examined in parallel, and thus it is unclear which of these two predominant approaches is more effective. Second, there has been a focus on misinformation that is explicitly false, but misinformation that uses literally true information to mislead is common in the real world. Finally, studies have relied mainly on questionnaire measures of reasoning, neglecting behavioural impacts of misinformation and interventions. To offer incremental progress towards addressing these three issues, we conducted an experiment (N = 735) involving misinformation on fair trade. We contrasted the effectiveness of prebunking versus debunking and the impacts of implied versus explicit misinformation, and incorporated novel measures assessing consumer behaviours (i.e., willingness-to-pay; information seeking; online misinformation promotion) in addition to standard questionnaire measures. In general, we found debunking to be more effective than prebunking, although both were able to reduce misinformation reliance. We also found that individuals tended to rely more on explicit than implied misinformation both with and without interventions.

KW - Fake news

KW - inoculation

KW - misinformation

KW - refutation

U2 - 10.1111/bjop.12551

DO - 10.1111/bjop.12551

M3 - Journal article

VL - 113

SP - 591

EP - 607

JO - British Journal of Psychology

JF - British Journal of Psychology

SN - 0007-1269

IS - 3

ER -