Social Media and Digital Collaboration
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Paper Number
2410
Paper Type
Completed
Description
Misinformation often has dire real-world consequences, so user-generated content (UGC) platforms have adopted misinformation mitigation strategies aimed at protecting their users. We study Reddit’s quarantine policy, a prominence reduction strategy that reduces the visibility of misinformation on the platform. We empirically assess the effectiveness, as well as spillover effects, of quarantine. We conceptualize misinformation spreading within problematic communities as being motivated by impure altruistic preferences. We further conceptualize user reactions to quarantine using attachment theory. We find for low-attachment behavior, quarantine diminishes misinformation contribution in the quarantined forum and pushes it to a topically related but ideologically neutral forums. For high-attachment behavior, quarantine does not affect misinformation contribution in the quarantined forum but increases the dispersion of misinformation on the platform. Our research sheds light on the efficacy, as well as potentially unintended consequences, of using prominence reduction strategies to fight misinformation.
Recommended Citation
Mudambi, Maya; Clark, Jessica; and Rhue, Lauren, "Altruistically Misinformed: Fighting Misinformation on Social Media with Prominence Reduction Strategies" (2021). ICIS 2021 Proceedings. 12.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/icis2021/social_media/social_media/12
Altruistically Misinformed: Fighting Misinformation on Social Media with Prominence Reduction Strategies
Misinformation often has dire real-world consequences, so user-generated content (UGC) platforms have adopted misinformation mitigation strategies aimed at protecting their users. We study Reddit’s quarantine policy, a prominence reduction strategy that reduces the visibility of misinformation on the platform. We empirically assess the effectiveness, as well as spillover effects, of quarantine. We conceptualize misinformation spreading within problematic communities as being motivated by impure altruistic preferences. We further conceptualize user reactions to quarantine using attachment theory. We find for low-attachment behavior, quarantine diminishes misinformation contribution in the quarantined forum and pushes it to a topically related but ideologically neutral forums. For high-attachment behavior, quarantine does not affect misinformation contribution in the quarantined forum but increases the dispersion of misinformation on the platform. Our research sheds light on the efficacy, as well as potentially unintended consequences, of using prominence reduction strategies to fight misinformation.
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