Fighting negative rumors with trust-based rumor-refutation strategy

Rumors about brands and products are a growing problem on social media, but systematic research on rumor-refutation strategies for various brands is limited. To advance research on rumor-refutation effects in the context of commercial rumor outbreaks, and to help brand managers better fight detrimental rumors against their brands, this study examined: 1) the influences of source trust (the degree to which the transmitter source of a rumor-refutation message is trusted by others within a social network) on the effectiveness of a rumor-refutation message, and 2) potential interaction effects of source trust and trust cues embedded in a rumor-refutation message. Using an interdisciplinary multi-method approach combining experimental and computational research approaches, findings demonstrate significant effects of the source trust factor on belief and retransmission intention of rumor-refutation. The results revealed an interesting moderating effect of the trust-cue factor. Theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed.