False beliefs persist, even after instant online corrections
Kelly Garrett |
It
seems like a great idea: Provide instant corrections to web-surfers when they
run across obviously false information on the Internet. But a new study
suggests that this type of tool may not be a panacea for dispelling inaccurate
beliefs, particularly among people who already want to believe the falsehood.
"Real-time
corrections do have some positive effect, but it is mostly with people who were
predisposed to reject the false claim anyway," said R. Kelly Garrett, lead
author of the study and assistant professor of communication at Ohio State
University.
"The
problem with trying to correct false information is that some people want to
believe it, and simply telling them it is false won't convince them."
For
example, the rumor that President Obama was not born in the United States was
widely believed during the past election season, even though it was thoroughly
debunked.
The
prospect of correcting falsehoods like this online before they have a chance to
spread widely has obvious appeal, Garrett said.
In
fact, it has already been attempted: A team from Intel and the University of
California, Berkeley, developed Dispute Finder, a plug-in for web browsers that
was released in 2009 and would alert users when they opened a webpage with a
disputed claim. That project has ended, but Garrett said similar efforts are
under way.
"Although
the average news user hasn't encountered real-time correction software yet, it
is in the works and I suspect it will see more widespread use soon," he
said.
But
will it work? In order to find out, Garrett conducted a study with Brian Weeks,
a graduate student in communication at Ohio State. Their study (available
here), which they will present Feb. 26 in Austin, Texas, appears in the 2013
Proceedings of the Computer Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing
conference.
Participants
in the study were a diverse group of 574 adults from across the country who
participated online.
The
experiment was designed to see what would happen when participants read false
statements copied from a "political blog" (actually text prepared by
the researchers) about the issue of electronic health records.
While
some of the information, collected from news stories and government sources,
was correct, the researchers also inserted several false statements about who
was allowed access to these records. For instance, the message falsely claimed
that hospital administrators, health insurance companies and even government
officials had unrestricted access to people's electronic health records.
The
participants were divided into three groups -- some were presented with an
immediate correction, saying that FactCheck.org, an independent fact-checking
organization, had concluded this blog post contained factual errors. Inaccurate
statements were italicized, enclosed in brackets and displayed in red, and a
detailed correction appeared at the bottom of the page.
Others
read the blog post with the errors, followed by completing an unrelated
three-minute task, and then were presented with the exact same correction.
The
final group was presented only with the inaccurate message during the study.
Afterwards,
all participants were asked how easy or difficult it would be for several
groups (including hospital administrators, government officials and others) to
access electronic health records. Participants were graded based on the
accuracy of their answers.
In
general, those who received the immediate correction were just slightly more
likely to be accurate than those who received the delayed correction. Those who
received no corrections were, not surprisingly, the least accurate.
But the
most interesting results came when the researchers analyzed who was influenced
by each kind of correction.
The
real-time correction worked well with participants who indicated at the
beginning of the study that they supported electronic health records, also
called EHRs.
"But
for those who opposed EHRs, the effect of the immediate correction was
essentially the same as if they had received no correction at all,"
Garrett said.
The
reason appears to be that opponents of EHRs discounted the credibility of the
source of the correction, Garrett said. On the other hand, the more favorably
an individual felt about EHRs, the more credible the correction was perceived
to be.
Although
this pattern was also evident among those who received the delayed correction,
the effect was significantly weaker.
Garrett
said the results of this study cast doubt on the theory that people who believe
false rumors need only to be educated about the truth to change their minds.
"Humans
aren't vessels into which you can just pour accurate information," he
said.
"Correcting
misperceptions is really a persuasion task. You have to convince people that,
while there are competing claims, one claim is clearly more accurate."
Garrett
noted that, while instant corrections were slightly more effective than delayed
corrections, the problem is that instant corrections actually increase
resistance among those whose attitudes are supported by the falsehood.
"We
would anticipate that systems like Dispute Finder would do little to change the
beliefs of the roughly one in six Americans who, despite exhaustive news
coverage and fact checking, continue to question whether President Obama was
born in the U.S.," he said.
Garrett
said it may be better to find a way to deliver corrections later, when people
may not be so defensive about their beliefs.
The
study was funded in part by the National Science Foundation.
Source: Ohio State University
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