School of Elderly Care Services and Management, Nanjing University of Chinese Medicine, 210023, Nanjing, China.
School of Sociology and Population Studies, Nanjing University of Posts and Telecommunications, 210023, Nanjing, China.
Soc Sci Med. 2024 Sep;356:117136. doi: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2024.117136. Epub 2024 Jul 15.
The escalating dissemination of health misinformation on social media platforms poses a significant threat to users' well-being. It is imperative to identify the types of health misinformation that are more susceptible to widespread dissemination and to explore strategies to curb its spread.
This study designed a 2 (emotional appeal type: positive vs. negative) × 2 (fabricated source type: pseudo-common vs. pseudo-authoritative) × 2 (accuracy-nudge label: No vs. Yes) online between-subjects experiment controlling for factors such as e-health literacy, prior sharing experience, and personal involvement. A snowball sampling approach was used to recruit 1952 participants through social media, resulting in a final sample of 1393 valid responses.
Compared to positive emotional appeal and pseudo-common sources, negative emotional appeal and pseudo-authoritative sources resulted in higher levels of sharing intention. Under the condition of negative emotional appeal, the promotion effect of pseudo-authoritative sources on sharing intention was intensified. The accuracy-nudge intervention could significantly mitigate this tendency. The underlying mechanisms revealed more details: both negative emotional appeals and pseudo-authoritative sources increased the perceived credibility of health misinformation, thereby increasing users' sharing intention. However, in contrast to pseudo-authoritative sources, excessive negative emotional appeal induced vigilant verification behavior among users, which reduced sharing to some extent. Adding an accuracy-nudge label to health misinformation reduced users' misguided trust in health misinformation features and stimulated information verification, ultimately reducing health misinformation sharing intention.
Negative emotional appeal and pseudo-authoritative sources can enhance the perceived credibility of health misinformation, thereby strengthening the sharing intention of social media users. Therefore, health misinformation with negative emotional appeal and pseudo-authoritative sources is more likely to be widely shared. The accuracy nudge intervention can trigger users' information verification behavior, suppress the persuasive effects of the misinformation features mentioned above, and help prevent the spread of health misinformation on social media.
社交媒体平台上健康错误信息的传播呈不断升级之势，对用户的健康构成了严重威胁。因此，当务之急是明确哪些类型的健康错误信息更容易广泛传播，并探索遏制其传播的策略。
本研究通过在线设计 2（情感诉求类型：积极与消极）×2（编造来源类型：似是而非的普通来源与似是而非的权威来源）×2（准确性提示标签：无与有）被试间实验，控制了电子健康素养、先前分享经验和个人卷入等因素。通过社交媒体采用雪球抽样法招募了 1952 名参与者，最终获得了 1393 份有效回复。
与积极的情感诉求和似是而非的普通来源相比，消极的情感诉求和似是而非的权威来源会导致更高的分享意愿。在消极情感诉求的条件下，似是而非的权威来源对分享意愿的促进作用得到了加强。准确性提示干预可以显著减轻这种趋势。潜在机制揭示了更多细节：消极情感诉求和似是而非的权威来源均增加了健康错误信息的感知可信度，从而增加了用户的分享意愿。然而，与似是而非的权威来源不同，过度的消极情感诉求会引起用户警惕性的验证行为，从而在一定程度上减少分享。为健康错误信息添加准确性提示标签可减少用户对健康错误信息特征的错误信任，并刺激信息验证，最终降低健康错误信息的分享意愿。
消极情感诉求和似是而非的权威来源可以增强健康错误信息的感知可信度，从而增强社交媒体用户的分享意愿。因此，带有消极情感诉求和似是而非的权威来源的健康错误信息更有可能被广泛分享。准确性提示干预可以触发用户的信息验证行为，抑制上述错误信息特征的说服力，并有助于防止健康错误信息在社交媒体上的传播。
