Softly empowering a prosocial expert in the family: lasting effects of a counter-misinformation intervention in an informational autocracy.
Sci Rep
; 14(1): 11763, 2024 05 23.
Article
en En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-38782940
ABSTRACT
The present work is the first to comprehensively analyze the gravity of the misinformation problem in Hungary, where misinformation appears regularly in the pro-governmental, populist, and socially conservative mainstream media. In line with international data, using a Hungarian representative sample (Study 1, N = 991), we found that voters of the reigning populist, conservative party could hardly distinguish fake from real news. In Study 2, we demonstrated that a prosocial intervention of ~ 10 min (N = 801) helped young adult participants discern misinformation four weeks later compared to the control group without implementing any boosters. This effect was the most salient regarding pro-governmental conservative fake news content, leaving real news evaluations intact. Although the hypotheses of the present work were not preregistered, it appears that prosocial misinformation interventions might be promising attempts to counter misinformation in an informational autocracy in which the media is highly centralized. Despite using social motivations, it does not mean that long-term cognitive changes cannot occur. Future studies might explore exactly how these interventions can have an impact on the long-term cognitive processing of news content as well as their underlying neural structures.
Palabras clave
Texto completo:
1
Colección:
01-internacional
Base de datos:
MEDLINE
Asunto principal:
Comunicación
Límite:
Adolescent
/
Adult
/
Female
/
Humans
/
Male
País/Región como asunto:
Europa
Idioma:
En
Revista:
Sci Rep
Año:
2024
Tipo del documento:
Article
País de afiliación:
Francia
Pais de publicación:
Reino Unido