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Adopting an Ecological Approach to Misinformation: Understanding the Broader Impacts on Online Communities

Published: 14 October 2023 Publication History

Abstract

Prior work has acknowledged the significance of social and community oriented factors in the spread and impacts of misinformation. However, interventions have largely focused on individual pieces of false and misleading content as misinformation, de-emphasizing the role of community-oriented factors that are involved in and contribute to the broad impacts of misinformation. My dissertation highlights the consequences that arise from such an individualistic focus. To account for the broader scope of this misinformation and its impacts, it proposes adopting an ecological perspective to misinformation. Employing this perspective, my work examines the community-level impacts of misinformation, from shaping perceptions about online communities to shifting the way online communities interpret and respond to the world’s events. Indeed, understanding and accounting for such significant impacts of misinformation on online communities is important if we hope to address the broader, systemic nature of misinformation and its effects at the community level.

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Cited By

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  • (2024)The Private Life of QAnon: A Mixed Methods Investigation of Americans' Exposure to QAnon Content on the WebProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/36870578:CSCW2(1-34)Online publication date: 8-Nov-2024
  • (2024)Investigating the Mechanisms by which Prevalent Online Community Behaviors Influence Responses to Misinformation: Do Perceived Norms Really Act as a Mediator?Proceedings of the 2024 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems10.1145/3613904.3641939(1-14)Online publication date: 11-May-2024

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cover image ACM Conferences
CSCW '23 Companion: Companion Publication of the 2023 Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing
October 2023
596 pages
ISBN:9798400701290
DOI:10.1145/3584931
Permission to make digital or hard copies of part or all of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for third-party components of this work must be honored. For all other uses, contact the Owner/Author.

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Published: 14 October 2023

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Author Tags

  1. Community-level Impacts
  2. Framing
  3. Meaning Constructions
  4. Misinformation
  5. Online Communities
  6. Perceived Social Norms

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View all
  • (2024)The Private Life of QAnon: A Mixed Methods Investigation of Americans' Exposure to QAnon Content on the WebProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/36870578:CSCW2(1-34)Online publication date: 8-Nov-2024
  • (2024)Investigating the Mechanisms by which Prevalent Online Community Behaviors Influence Responses to Misinformation: Do Perceived Norms Really Act as a Mediator?Proceedings of the 2024 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems10.1145/3613904.3641939(1-14)Online publication date: 11-May-2024

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