Does explaining the origins of misinformation improve the effectiveness of a given correction?

Resumen

Misinformation often has a continuing influence on event-related reasoning even when it is clearly and credibly corrected; this is referred to as the continued influence effect. The present work investigated whether a correction’s effectiveness can be improved by explaining how the misinformation originated. Two experiments examined whether a correction that explained misinformation as originating from intentional deception, or an unintentional error were more effective than a correction that only identified the misinformation as false. Experiment 1 found that corrections which explained the misinformation as intentionally or unintentionally misleading were as effective as a correction that was not accompanied by an explanation for how the misinformation originated. We replicated this in Experiment 2 and found substantial attenuation of the continued influence effect in a novel scenario with the same underlying structure. Overall, the results suggest that informing people that the misinformation originated from a deliberate lie or accidental error may not be an effective correction strategy over and above stating that the misinformation is false.

Áreas y palabras clave

Cómo citar (APA 7)

Desai, S. C., & Reimers, S. (2022). Does explaining the origins of misinformation improve the effectiveness of a given correction?. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/fxkzc