Department of Government, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH, USA.
School of Medicine, University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, CA, USA.
Sci Adv. 2020 Jan 29;6(5):eaaw7449. doi: 10.1126/sciadv.aaw7449. eCollection 2020 Jan.
Disease epidemics and outbreaks often generate conspiracy theories and misperceptions that mislead people about the risks they face and how best to protect themselves. We investigate the effectiveness of interventions aimed at combating false and unsupported information about the Zika epidemic and subsequent yellow fever outbreak in Brazil. Results from a nationally representative survey show that conspiracy theories and other misperceptions about Zika are widely believed. Moreover, results from three preregistered survey experiments suggest that efforts to counter misperceptions about diseases during epidemics and outbreaks may not always be effective. We find that corrective information not only fails to reduce targeted Zika misperceptions but also reduces the accuracy of other beliefs about the disease. In addition, although corrective information about the better-known threat from yellow fever was more effective, none of these corrections affected support for vector control policies or intentions to engage in preventive behavior.
疾病疫情的爆发常常会引发各种阴谋论和误解，从而误导人们对所面临的风险以及如何最好地保护自己的认识。我们调查了旨在对抗有关寨卡疫情和巴西随后黄热病爆发的虚假和无事实依据的信息的干预措施的有效性。一项全国代表性调查的结果显示，人们普遍相信有关寨卡的阴谋论和其他误解。此外，三项预先注册的调查实验的结果表明，在疫情和疾病爆发期间对抗误解的努力可能并不总是有效。我们发现，纠正信息不仅未能减少针对寨卡的误解，反而降低了对其他有关该疾病的信念的准确性。此外，尽管有关黄热病这一更为人所知的威胁的纠正信息更为有效，但这些纠正措施都没有影响对病媒控制政策的支持或预防行为的意愿。
