How do users respond to online rumor rebuttals?

Factors influencing college students' online rumor refuting behavior during major public health crises: the moderating effect of group norms

This study integrates SOR (Stimuli-Organism-Response) theoretical framework and rational behavior theory within a theoretical framework, incorporating group norms as a moderating factor to investigate the psychological mechanisms influencing Chinese college students' online rumor-refutation behavior amidst public health crises. Using the structural equation modeling research method, data was collected via questionnaires from 1,254 participants in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. The findings indicate that both online and offline information seeking are positively correlated with college students' attitudes and subjective norms. Moreover, the attitudes and subjective norms of college students are positively correlated with the online rumor refuting behavior. Furthermore, group norms serve to strengthen the connection between college students' attitudes and their engagement in online refuting rumors. These results illuminate the psychological underpinnings driving college students' online rumor-refuting actions, offering practical and policy implications for effectively managing rumor behaviors.

A Cross-Country Analysis of the Combined Influence of Social Media Use and Perceived Social Media Networks on Pandemic Communicative Responses

This study examines how social media (SM) use is related to human responses to emerging infectious disease risks in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic via an online survey conducted in the United States and Taiwan. Results showed that SM use was related to different types of communicative responses (information seeking, interpersonal discussion, and rumor correction) directly and indirectly through cognitive and affective responses (risk perception, responsibility attribution, and negative and positive emotions). The indirect relationships between SM use and communicative responses through these cognitive and affective responses were moderated by perceived SM network structures. In particular, the mediating influence of negative emotions on communicative responses was associated with perceived SM network homogeneity, while that of positive emotions was related to perceived SM network centrality. Furthermore, responsibility attribution drove Taiwanese SM users' communicative responses, whereas the interrelated influence of positive emotions and perceived SM network centrality shaped American SM users' communicative responses.

Exploring rumor behavior during the COVID-19 pandemic through an information processing perspective: The moderating role of critical thinking

In the midst of the pervasive disruption caused by the proliferation of rumors, it is unclear how individuals react to such information. Guided by the SOR theory (Stimuli-Organism-Response), our study investigates the association between different information sources (stimuli), emotions experienced by individuals (organism), and resulting rumor behaviors such as sharing and refuting (response). Furthermore, we examine the moderating role of individual critical thinking in this process. Using the COVID-19 pandemic as a study scenario, we collected questionnaire data from 4588 respondents. Our results reveal a large positive association between pandemic-related information and feelings of fear. Additionally, a medium negative correlation between fear and rumor sharing was observed while a moderate positive correlation between fear and rumor refuting was identified. Moreover, we found that individual critical thinking abilities can effectively moderate the relationship between fear and online COVID-19-related information and strengthen the link between fear and rumor sharing while weakening the link between fear and rumor refuting. Additionally, our study indicates that an individual's fear plays a mediating role in the relationship between information sources and rumor behavior. Our findings shed light on the information processing mechanisms underlying rumor behaviors and yield practical and policy implications for managing them.

Fighting rumors to fight COVID-19: Investigating rumor belief and sharing on social media during the pandemic

The outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic, a significant health threat, influenced information-related behaviors and induced increased rumor-sharing behaviors on social media. Fighting COVID-19 thus entails the need to fight the rumors as well, providing a strong motivation to explore rumor-related behavior during this extraordinary period. From the perspective of information acquisition, we predicted that information acquisition from social and traditional media would interactively influence rumor-related decisions (i.e., rumor belief and sharing) and that critical thinking would shape this relationship. Through a survey of 2424 individuals who used social media during the pandemic, we found that information acquisition from social media was negatively related to rumor sharing and that rumor belief mediated this relationship. Meanwhile, information acquisition from traditional media weakened the negative effect of information acquisition from social media on rumor belief, and critical thinking alleviated the positive effect of rumor belief on rumor sharing. This study contributes to the literature by explaining the diffusion of COVID-19 rumors on social media from an information perspective and revealing how different information sources and thinking styles come into conflict in rumor decisions.

What determines online rumour sharing on COVID-19? A stimulus–response framework

Based on the stimulus–response framework, this study examines the external environmental stimuli influencing online rumour sharing about COVID-19 and considers the contingent effect of fear. A large-scale online survey was used to test the proposed research model and hypotheses. The final data set comprised 2807 valid responses. The results indicate that perceptions of community safety and infection risk negatively affect online rumour sharing, while social influence positively affects online rumour sharing. Fear weakens the negative effects of community safety on online rumour sharing but strengthens the positive effect of social influence on online rumour sharing. This study provides a comprehensive analysis by applying the stimulus–response framework to explore the underlying drivers of online rumour sharing with regard to COVID-19 and the moderating effects of fear in the Chinese context.

Interaction between official institutions and influential users of rumor control in online social networks

Online interactions have become major channels for people to obtain and disseminate information during the new normal of COVID-19, which can also be a primary platform for rumor propagation. There are many complex psychological reasons for spreading rumors, but previous studies have not fully analyzed this problem from the perspective of the interaction between official institutions and influential users. The purpose of this study is to determine optimal strategies for official institutions considering the impact of two different influential user types (trolls and reputed personalities) by designing two game-theoretic models, namely "Rumor Clarification and Interaction Model" and "Rumor Verification and Interaction Model," which can, respectively decide whether to clarify and when to clarify. The results of this article show that clarification strategies can be decided according to the characteristics of rumors and the influential user's reactions. Meanwhile, publishing verified information prevents trolls' "loophole advantages" and prevents reputed personalities from spreading false information due to the vague authenticity of rumors. Results also show that the verification strategy is limited by cost, period, and verification index.

The Effects of Personality Traits on Online Rumor Sharing: The Mediating Role of Fear of COVID-19

This study aims to explore the effects of personality traits on online rumor sharing during the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and the mediating role of the fear of COVID-19 between them. We conducted this research using a web-based questionnaire distributed to 452 university students who were invited to fill it out. The partial least square structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) method was used to test the data and model, with the yielded results demonstrating that three—extroversion, emotional instability, and conscientiousness—of the Big Five personality traits are positively related to a fear of COVID-19, with this fear positively affecting online rumor sharing. Moreover, fear of COVID-19 was found to act as a mediator between personality traits and online rumor sharing; thus, we can conclude that persons with high levels of extroversion, emotional instability, and conscientiousness are more likely to share rumors online due to a fear of COVID-19. This study furthers our understanding of the psychological mechanism by which personality traits influence online rumor sharing and provides references for anti-rumor campaigns taking place during the COVID-19 pandemic, as it identifies key groups and sheds light on the necessity of reducing people’s fear of COVID-19.

A Study on the Effectiveness of Rumor Control via Social Media Networks to Alleviate Public Panic About COVID-19

The COVID-19 outbreak triggered a massive spread of unverified news on social media and has become a source of rumors. This paper studies the impact of a virtual rumor control center (RCC) on Weibo user behavior. The collected COVID-19 breaking news stories were divided into positive, negative, and neutral categories, while the moderating effect model was used to analyze the influence of anti-rumor on user behavior (forwarding, liking, and commenting). Our research found that rumor refuting does not directly affect user behavior but does have an indirect moderating effect. Rumor refuting has a profound impact on user forwarding behavior in cases of positive and negative news. Specifically, when the epidemic becomes more serious, the role of rumor refuting becomes critical, and vice versa. Refuting rumors reduces user willingness to forward positive or negative news, with more impact on negative news. Time lag analysis shows a significant moderation of unverified news within 72 h of refuting rumors but indicated an apparent weakening trend over time. Furthermore, we discovered non-linear feature and counter-cyclical phenomena in the moderating effect of rumor refutation.

Factors influencing fake news rebuttal acceptance during the COVID-19 pandemic and the moderating effect of cognitive ability

Fake news is spreading rapidly on social media and poses a serious threat to the COVID-19 outbreak response. This study thus aims to reveal the factors influencing the acceptance of fake news rebuttals on Sina Weibo. Drawing on the elaboration likelihood model (ELM), we used text mining and the econometrics method to investigate the relationships among the central route (rebuttal's information readability and argument quality), peripheral route (rebuttal's source credibility, including authority and influence), and rebuttal acceptance, as well as the moderating effect of receiver's cognitive ability on these relationships. Our findings suggest that source authority had a negative effect on rebuttal acceptance, while source influence had a positive effect. Second, both information readability and argument quality had positive effects on rebuttal acceptance. In addition, individuals with low cognitive abilities relied more on source credibility and argument quality to accept rebuttals, while individuals with high cognitive abilities relied more on information readability. This study can provide decision support for practitioners to establish more effective fake news rebuttal strategies; it is especially valuable to reduce the negative impact of fake news related to major public health emergencies and safeguard the implementation of anti-epidemic strategies.

Machine learning techniques and older adults processing of online information and misinformation: A covid 19 study

This study is informed by two research gaps. One, Artificial Intelligence's (AI's) Machine Learning (ML) techniques have the potential to help separate information and misinformation, but this capability has yet to be empirically verified in the context of COVID-19. Two, while older adults can be particularly susceptible to the virus as well as its online infodemic, their information processing behaviour amid the pandemic has not been understood. Therefore, this study explores and understands how ML techniques (Study 1), and humans, particularly older adults (Study 2), process the online infodemic regarding COVID-19 prevention and cure. Study 1 employed ML techniques to classify information and misinformation. They achieved a classification accuracy of 86.7% with the Decision Tree classifier, and 86.67% with the Convolutional Neural Network model. Study 2 then investigated older adults' information processing behaviour during the COVID-19 infodemic period using some of the posts from Study 1. Twenty older adults were interviewed. They were found to be more willing to trust traditional media rather than new media. They were often left confused about the veracity of online content related to COVID-19 prevention and cure. Overall, the paper breaks new ground by highlighting how humans' information processing differs from how algorithms operate. It offers fresh insights into how during a pandemic, older adults-a vulnerable demographic segment-interact with online information and misinformation. On the methodological front, the paper represents an intersection of two very disparate paradigms-ML techniques and interview data analyzed using thematic analysis and concepts drawn from grounded theory to enrich the scholarly understanding of human interaction with cutting-edge technologies.

The causes, impacts and countermeasures of COVID-19 "Infodemic": A systematic review using narrative synthesis

An unprecedented infodemic has been witnessed to create massive damage to human society. However, it was not thoroughly investigated. This systematic review aims to (1) synthesize the existing literature on the causes and impacts of COVID-19 infodemic; (2) summarize the proposed strategies to fight with COVID-19 infodemic; and (3) identify the directions for future research. A systematic literature search following the PRISMA guideline covering 12 scholarly databases was conducted to retrieve various types of peer-reviewed articles that reported causes, impacts, or countermeasures of the infodemic. Empirical studies were assessed for risk of bias using the Mixed-Methods Appraisal Tool. A coding theme was iteratively developed to categorize the causes, impacts, and countermeasures found from the included studies. Social media usage, low level of health/eHealth literacy, and fast publication process and preprint service are identified as the major causes of the infodemic. Besides, the vicious circle of human rumor-spreading behavior and the psychological issues from the public (e.g., anxiety, distress, fear) emerges as the characteristic of the infodemic. Comprehensive lists of countermeasures are summarized from different perspectives, among which risk communication and consumer health information need/seeking are of particular importance. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed and future research directions are suggested.

Factors affecting individual online rumor sharing behavior in the COVID-19 pandemic

With the outbreak of COVID-19, online sharing of rumors about the disease is of growing concern worldwide. Drawing on the stimulus–organism–response (S–O-R) framework, this study aims to explore the impacts of peer condition and peer communication on fear of COVID-19, and the impact of fear of COVID-19 on online rumor sharing behavior, by considering the contingency effect of health self-efficacy. Data from 1167 respondents to an online survey in China were adopted to test our research model. The results indicate that peer communication and peer condition induce fear of COVID-19, and fear of COVID-19 results in online rumor sharing. Fear of COVID-19 mediates the effects of peer communication and peer condition on online rumor sharing. Health self-efficacy alleviates the positive effect of peer communication on fear of COVID-19, and the positive effect of fear of COVID-19 on online rumor sharing. This study advances the literature on online rumor sharing and S–O-R, and provides practical implications to social media users and governments.

Why people spread rumors on social media: developing and validating a multi-attribute model of online rumor dissemination

Purpose

Dealing with online rumors or fake information on social media is growing in importance. Most academic research on online rumors has approached the issue from a quantitative modeling perspective. Less attention has been paid to the psychological mechanisms accounting for online rumor transmission behavior on the individual level. Drawing from the theory of stimulus–organism–response, this study aims to explore the nature of online rumors and investigate how the informational characteristics of online rumors are processed through the mediation of psychological variables to promote online rumor forwarding.

Design/methodology/approach

An experimental approach to this issue was taken; the researchers investigated how the informational characteristics of online rumors and the psychological mediators promote online rumor transmission.

Findings

Four information characteristics (sense-making, funniness, dreadfulness and personal relevance) and three psychological motivators (fact-finding, relationship enhancement and self-enhancement) promote online rumor-forwarding behavior.

Originality/value

Because any online rumor transmitted on social media can go viral, companies may eventually encounter social media-driven crises. Thus, understanding what drives rumor-forwarding behavior can help marketers mitigate and counter online rumors.