Abstract
The World Health Organization declared the deluge of publicly available information about COVID-19 to be an “infodemic,” comprising both facts and misinformation. Researchers don’t know exactly the degree to which people believe the misinformation they see online, but, in the case of COVID-19, belief in conspiracy theories related to the virus is associated with people being less willing to get vaccinated, potentially putting public health at risk. There’s no silver bullet to countering the online misinformation that can lead to these sorts of consequential misperceptions, but the good news is that multiple overlapping misinformation interventions, including correcting false information, can help.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 129-133 |
| Number of pages | 5 |
| Journal | Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists |
| Volume | 77 |
| Issue number | 3 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - May 4 2021 |
| Externally published | Yes |
Bibliographical note
Publisher Copyright:© 2021 Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.
Keywords
- COVID-19
- Misinformation
- corrections
- infodemic
- social media