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

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 thecontinued 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.

Criminal networks analysis in missing data scenarios through graph distances

Data collected in criminal investigations may suffer from issues like: (i) incompleteness, due to the covert nature of criminal organizations; (ii) incorrectness, caused by either unintentional data collection errors or intentional deception by criminals; (iii) inconsistency, when the same information is collected into law enforcement databases multiple times, or in different formats. In this paper we analyze nine real criminal networks of different nature (i.e., Mafia networks, criminal street gangs and terrorist organizations) in order to quantify the impact of incomplete data, and to determine which network type is most affected by it. The networks are firstly pruned using two specific methods: (i) random edge removal, simulating the scenario in which the Law Enforcement Agencies fail to intercept some calls, or to spot sporadic meetings among suspects; (ii) node removal, modeling the situation in which some suspects cannot be intercepted or investigated. Finally we compute spectral distances (i.e., Adjacency, Laplacian and normalized Laplacian Spectral Distances) and matrix distances (i.e., Root Euclidean Distance) between the complete and pruned networks, which we compare using statistical analysis. Our investigation identifies two main features: first, the overall understanding of the criminal networks remains high even with incomplete data on criminal interactions (i.e., when 10% of edges are removed); second, removing even a small fraction of suspects not investigated (i.e., 2% of nodes are removed) may lead to significant misinterpretation of the overall network.

Mistake or Manipulation? Conceptualizing Perceived Mis- and Disinformation among News Consumers in 10 European Countries

In the midst of heated debates surrounding the veracity and honesty of communication, scholarly attention has turned to the conceptualization of mis- and disinformation on the supply-side of (political) communication. Yet, we lack systematic research on the conceptualization of perceived mis- and disinformation on the demand-side. Original survey data collected in ten European countries ( N = 6,643) shows that news consumers distinguish general misinformation from disinformation. Yet, the high correlation between the two dimensions indicates that disinformation perceptions may be regarded as a sub-type of misinformation perceptions in which intentional deception is a core element. This paper aims to make a contribution to the misinformation and media credibility literature by proposing a first conceptualization of perceived untruthfulness corresponding to increasing levels of cynicism and skepticism toward the factual status and honesty of information.

Too scared to shop: The role of apatephobia, trust, risk, and suspicion in market exchanges

According to the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, in 2018 there were over 1.4 million reports of fraud resulting in an estimated loss to consumers of $1.48 billion (Federal Trade Commission, 2019). A natural reaction to the prevalence of fraudulent transactions is apatephobia, or a fear of intentional deception leading to less desirable outcomes in a market exchange. The current paper relates apatephobia to the literature on trust, risk, suspicion, defensive processing, emotions, and counterfactual thinking and offers 15 propositions related to these constructs. Further, a nomological network is proposed which relates these constructs together, identifies the conditions under which apatephobia will result in a consumer declining to engage in an exchange, and the feedback mechanism by which being deceived strengthens the motivation to avoid any future reoccurrence. Little academic attention has been paid to a fear of being deceived, thus I expect the current work to be of interest to researchers in the area of trust, risk, and deception.

The Psychological Appeal of Fake-News Attributions

The term fake news is increasingly used to discredit information from reputable news organizations. We tested the possibility that fake-news claims are appealing because they satisfy the need to see the world as structured. Believing that news organizations are involved in an orchestrated disinformation campaign implies a more orderly world than believing that the news is prone to random errors. Across six studies ( N > 2,800), individuals with dispositionally high or situationally increased need for structure were more likely to attribute contested news stories to intentional deception than to journalistic incompetence. The effect persisted for stories that were ideologically consistent and ideologically inconsistent and after analyses controlled for strength of political identification. Political orientation showed a moderating effect; specifically, the link between need for structure and belief in intentional deception was stronger for Republican participants than for Democratic participants. This work helps to identify when, why, and for whom fake-news claims are persuasive.

The Psychological Appeal of Fake News Attributions

The term “fake news” is increasingly used to discredit information from reputable news organizations. We test the possibility that fake news claims are appealing because they satisfy the need to see the world as structured. Believing that the news is involved in an orchestrated disinformation campaign implies a more orderly world than believing the news is prone to random errors. Across six studies (N > 2800), individuals with dispositionally high or situationally increased need for structure were more likely to attribute contested news stories to intentional deception than to journalistic incompetence. The effect persisted for stories that were ideologically consistent and inconsistent and after controlling for strength of political identification. Political orientation showed a moderating effect, such that the link between need for structure and belief in intentional deception was stronger for Republican than Democratic participants. This work helps identify when, why, and for whom fake news claims are persuasive.

Consumer Fraud

Consumer fraud is the intentional deception of one or more individuals with the promise of goods, services, or other financial benefits that either never existed, were never going to be provided, or were grossly misrepresented. In contrast to ancient times when consumer fraud and other white-collar crimes were considered to be at least as serious as violence and other street crimes, today’s consumer fraudster tends to be viewed as less dangerous and deserving of harsh sanctioning. Despite several social movements against consumer fraud and a proliferation of popular and scholarly literature on the topic, contemporary U.S. society has maintained a relatively lenient stance toward white-collar crime—a “soft on crime” position that is inconsistent with conservative “tough on crime” approaches that have dominated U.S. penal policy since the 1960s.

The ethics of online research with unsuspecting users: From A/B testing to C/D experimentation

This article analyzes recent cases of company-sponsored online experiments with unsuspecting users and discusses the ethical aspects of such experimentation. These cases illustrate a new type of online research where companies modify their algorithms to intentionally misinform or mislead users. Unlike typical forms of A/B testing, where two versions of the same website are presented to different users to evaluate interface changes, algorithm modification is a deeper form of testing where changes in program code induce user deception. Thus, we propose to call this new approach C/D experimentation to distinguish it from the surface-level website evaluation associated with A/B testing. Three aspects raise ethical concerns regarding C/D experimentation: the absence of user consent to participate in research, the presence of intentional deception, and the complete lack of protection for human subjects who partake in privately funded behavioral research. Three recommendations are proposed to address these issues: (i) to develop an ethical code of conduct for subject protection shared by online companies, (ii) to include special provisions for C/D experiments in social networking platforms, and (iii) to create an independent user advocacy board to protect the rights of users who partake in online research conducted in the private sector.

Hypergame Theory: A Model for Conflict, Misperception, and Deception

When dealing with conflicts, game theory and decision theory can be used to model the interactions of the decision-makers. To date, game theory and decision theory have received considerable modeling focus, while hypergame theory has not. A metagame, known as a hypergame, occurs when one player does not know or fully understand all the strategies of a game. Hypergame theory extends the advantages of game theory by allowing a player to outmaneuver an opponent and obtaining a more preferred outcome with a higher utility. The ability to outmaneuver an opponent occurs in the hypergame because the different views (perception or deception) of opponents are captured in the model, through the incorporation of information unknown to other players (misperception or intentional deception). The hypergame model more accurately provides solutions for complex theoretic modeling of conflicts than those modeled by game theory and excels where perception or information differences exist between players. This paper explores the current research in hypergame theory and presents a broad overview of the historical literature on hypergame theory.