Dissertation
Echo Chambers and Misinformation: How Social Media Use Conditions Individuals to Believe Fake News
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Washington State University
07/2019
Handle:
https://hdl.handle.net/2376/16815
Abstract
Research has suggested that personalized information streams on social media platforms (i.e., echo chambers) contribute to the proliferation of fake news. Using a combination of laboratory and survey experiments, I find that homogeneous discussion groups and echo chambers cause individuals to engage in more impulsive, affect-driven thought over deliberate, critical analysis. I also find that even when controlling for other factors, high social media use conditions individuals to believe fake material. While removing individuals from partisan echo chambers does make participants less susceptible to believing fake news, these effects appear confined to Democrats. Republican participants in echo chambers believe fake news to be true at similar rates to their counterparts who receive more heterogeneous information streams. This is important considering that the vast majority of fake news consumers are Republicans. My research suggests that breaking up echo chambers may only make a marginal difference in the spread of online misinformation.
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Details
- Title
- Echo Chambers and Misinformation
- Creators
- Samuel Callahan Rhodes
- Contributors
- Travis Nelson Ridout (Advisor) - Washington State University, Politics, Philosophy and Public Affairs, School of
- Awarding Institution
- Washington State University
- Academic Unit
- Politics, Philosophy and Public Affairs, School of
- Theses and Dissertations
- Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Washington State University
- Identifiers
- 99900890527201842
- Language
- English
- Resource Type
- Dissertation