Who would believe something like that?
How your degree determines your susceptibility to false information and “fake news”
A Proposal: Spring 2023
Introduction
A lot of talk has been had over the issues surrounding “fake news” and disinformation. Finger-pointing seems to be one of the few things that can cross the political aisle these days. Is there a particular audience that is more susceptible to believing false information? Knowing this could allow for targeted methods of education to fight misinformation preemptively or to debunk spreading rumors and falsehoods. There have been multiple studies conducted on the effects of education on belief in misinformation, along with a slew of other differences, including political affiliation. Those who are more educated, having completed a bachelor's or advanced degree, will have a different set of reasoning skills when compared to those who joined the workforce immediately after high school. For our purposes, we wish to know what effect the type of educational background one may have on susceptibility to false information. Certain educational degrees and areas of study may be more or less vulnerable to the effects of fake news than others. If this is the case, it would be beneficial to know which areas of study may need more attention when it comes to arming against false information.
Who Falls for the Framing?
Our question focuses specifically on STEM degrees versus humanities, social sciences, and liberal arts, essentially everything that is non-STEM. Over the past few decades, there has been an emphasis on the importance of STEM and a large push towards encouraging young individuals to pursue degrees away from humanities degrees, for example.9 While doctors, mathematicians, and engineers are typically considered some of the smartest individuals in society, the question is whether or not they utilize different reasoning skills and may be more susceptible to conspiratorial thought when compared to those who have, for example, a degree in history and may understand complex government structures and interpersonal dynamics in a more in-depth way.7
Further, we seek to understand if there is a difference in STEM degrees. Is a mathematician more or less likely to believe conspiracy theories around the Covid-19 vaccine, for example? Basic reasoning would say that those with a particularly relevant degree would be the most immune of those with a scientific background. However, for those who have little experience in virology, it would stand to reason that a scientific background would not necessarily be helpful; instead, reasoning skills and an ability to discern what would make a source either trustworthy or questionable would be far more helpful than anything offered by a non-applicable scientific or mathematic background.9
When it comes to the rise of “fake news” and misinformation, it will stand to reason that the ability to parse out trustworthy authority figures would be the most helpful in understanding what information makes the most sense to believe. In this instance, something like a Philosophy degree, often considered a throwaway degree by some, may prove more useful than an engineering degree.7 However, it’s not simply the skills that are taught. There is also diversity to consider. STEM degrees have often been a wasteland when it comes to diversity of thought and background.16 This lack of association between individuals of varying backgrounds and experiences may promote an inability to see or understand alternate perspectives and new information, along with an inability or hesitancy to question authority figures.
The Power of Media Manipulation
Many studies have sought to understand media manipulation and its potential effect on citizens. While the type of subject we are discussing may seem separate from things like elections or candidate approval ratings, we can not dismiss the findings outright as they shed light on the underlying topic of a person's psychology. For instance, the role of media priming has been shown to have an effect on campaigns and elections, often shaping messaging in ways that might help bend public perception in a way that is favorable toward a particular person or campaign.4 Indeed, Diana C. Mutz, in her research in media priming, concluded that exposure to media reporting and second-hand accounts of an issue might actually have a bigger impact than a personal experience. 12 This is a powerful point of reference when considering how hearing about false information may be able to influence individuals without the need for real-world experiences.
We have seen that the public may be inclined to follow the information presented by top leaders and that the media may not be inclined to challenge narratives presented by a trusted source, such as a well-liked president or another politician. A false narrative supported by an authority figure can be dangerous and lead to disastrous outcomes, such as the U.S. invasion of Iraq due to the misinformation surrounding Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMDs).10 Real-world and modern examples like this help to highlight the importance of this question and the research at hand. These misconceptions can be difficult to challenge. The idea that there is a partisan divide could, in theory, lead to greater accountability in this regard; instead, it has led to an overall mistrust of the media and less accountability overall. In fact, as previously mentioned, some research suggests that partisan divides have been critical in helping false information spread and conspiracies take hold.14 It is certainly easy to see how deferring to authority figures and even trusted media commentators could leave someone vulnerable to manipulation through the media, either directly or indirectly, particularly for those that may have spent far less of their educational career on things like history or logic.
Hypothesis & Variables
The variables we seek to test and manipulate are very straightforward and simple in this instance. There is a single independent and a single dependent variable to consider. The independent variable we will subject to treatment is that of education type. A sub-independent variable could prove to be the level of higher education (for example, two years versus a full 4-year degree); however, for our purposes, this is more of an afterthought than a main focus. Depending on the study outcome, it may be worth looking at the years of advanced education in more detail. The dependent variable can best be described as a belief in or a willingness to believe conspiracy theories and susceptibility to misinformation, which we will be able to measure based on the effects of the treatment.
Hypotheses:
STEM Degrees will overall be more susceptible to manipulation tactics.
Non-medical degrees will be more likely to believe vaccine-related false information.
More years of education in a Non-STEM degree will make one less likely to believe false information.
More years of STEM-related education (i.e., a completed degree) will make one more susceptible to false information.
Method & Reasoning
For the purposes of this study, we will be using a lab model as opposed to a field study to allow for greater control of the priming mechanism. Using volunteers found through MTurk, we administer a multistep test. A sample size of 600 participants, with roughly 300 males and 300 females, should give us sufficient data and allow us to account for gender differences. Participants will be grouped according to which conspiratorial article they receive. The experiment groups are completely randomized with two possible manipulations/treatments and a control group that will read something non-conspiratorial and innocuous in nature.
Research has shown that episodic framing of an issue evokes more emotion from a test subject as opposed to thematic frames.1 As we are hoping to elicit the most meaningful response from individuals, whether or not that is for or against the given conspiracy, it would be best to focus on the episodic type of framing. The examples of the treatment and an explanation are given below for a frame of reference. We also know that “pure emphasis framing” alone is not enough to significantly sway public opinion, and thus, politicians and political parties must frequently employ other tactics and provide alternate arguments and evidence to support their claims and positions.11 Thus, our conclusion to use the framing that is most likely to create a reaction without employing other methods is solidified. Both manipulations (one on the Covid vaccine and one on elections) provide a narrative story format in order to evoke the most significant response from the subject; whether or not that response is statistically significant is what we seek to measure.
Beginning with a basic questionnaire on demographic and educational information (Appendix A), we can gather a baseline for the test. This section includes several educational questions to assess what level of education an individual has, along with the same age and other demographic questions. The goal is to be able to categorize participants into groups according to the type of education and level of education in addition to the other demographic categories. We would be remiss to leave out the idea that we would need to gather information on the type of news sources our subjects typically engage with and at what level they engage, whether it is rarely or frequently.
After the demographic information has been collected, we move into the primer, a false study that will affirm, at least partially, that a conspiracy theory may hold some truth. It has been shown that individuals may have a greater understanding of the context of a given article when a hard copy is read as opposed to a digital copy. For that reason, the articles will be printed and read in hard. However, as we are attempting to cut down on anything that may prime an individual to have a partisan response (i.e., disagreeing with an article because it is from a conservative source or vice versa), there is no attempt to make any identifying information available.2 Once the individuals have read the report findings, we will then be able to assess how reasonable these assertions seem to a given individual.
Both the demographic section and the post-test (Appendix B) administered after treatment will rely on a 7-point scale. The options will allow us to gauge any possible correlations between things we’d expect, such as those who regularly engage with more trusted news sources to be less gullible when given the treatments or vulnerability correlating with a conspiracy that may already appeal to their beliefs. We will then also be able to discern which of the possible educational options correlate with the greater response from the given treatment, if any. The scale will range from “completely agree” to “completely disagree” and will allow for neat categorization of respondents' choices once the post-test has been conducted. A lower score will indicate less effect, while a higher score will indicate a possible treatment effect. The post-test questionnaire will be administered to all participants, including the control group, and will have questions applying to both manipulations. This should allow for an assessment of any possible link between believing in false information regardless of the prompt.
The Treatment
Our treatment consists of two types of conspiracies. One scientific in nature that has seemingly appealed to conservatives in recent history.8 This first article consists of a story surrounding the potentially detrimental effects of vaccination use in regard to combatting the Covid-19 pandemic. This primer will provide a report that recent studies have shown the Covid vaccine to be declining in efficacy while having more adverse effects when combined with a new Covid variant that has so far only been found in Africa. We will provide a first-hand account of the effects that one individual has dealt with despite being vaccinated or perhaps because of their vaccination. There are a few reasons to frame this misleading report in such a way as to make it more believable to an audience that may not be as inclined to mistrust the vaccine. As it is not a report from this country (the United States), subjects may be less inclined to dismiss it as contrary to their own experiences, thereby making them more open to the possibility of a new strain reacting detrimentally to the Covid vaccine.
Our next treatment will center around questions of election integrity. While it has been common to associate this type of misinformation with more conservative beliefs, this treatment is designed to appeal more to liberal-minded individuals and focuses on doubt surrounding the election in Georgia. The article will note that it is suspected that millions of people of color may have been significantly impacted and disenfranchised, leading to an outcome that skewed Republican despite clear evidence from the victory of Raphael Warnock that the state is trending Blue and its citizens had no interest in maintaining a Republican status quo. This article will center on the story of an individual who attempted to vote but was unable to due to difficulting getting to their local polling location.
The idea of voting access has been a hot topic in democratic politics. This discussion hit a fever pitch during the 2020 election when the Covid-19 pandemic created uncertainty surrounding the safety of voting in person. Despite record turnout in Georgia, Senator Raphael Warnock still pointed to issues in regard to voting access for citizens and wait times that many democratic leaders viewed as a purposeful deterrent to participation akin to classic suppression tactics.15 It is, of course, entirely possible that the available data surrounding this race led citizens to believe that their votes were critical, creating a counterbalance to the suppression tactics implemented. Evidence suggests that people are more likely to participate in the political process when they feel the outcome of the race is uncertain.17 That being said, as there is no concrete or even significant evidence of mass implementation of voter suppression tactics, this clearly falls under the category of conspiratorial thinking.
The Concern
It is worth noting that our primers are somewhat skewed politically, although we have clearly attempted to create treatment manipulations that would be more appealing to both conservatives and liberals. To be clear, humans are all inclined to conspiratorial thought. This is true regardless of political affiliation and ideology. There has become a narrative that somehow conservative-leaning individuals might be more inclined to believe conspiracy theories. While there are plenty of theories surrounding this issue, perhaps the predisposition to fear or anxiety around change makes one more susceptible; there is no clear correlation. Perhaps there are particular personality traits that make an individual more susceptible to a particular conspiracy and also predispose that same individual to identify with a particular political party; such an assertion would seem likely.3 Politically, there is a thought surrounding conspiracy theories that have cropped up on the right side of the political aisle; however, this is not the same as conservatives being more naive or more prone to this set of beliefs. It is worth noting that partisanship seems to be more of a driving force in the perpetuation of conspiracy theories as opposed to the idea that a particular party is a catalyst.14
For instance, a YouGov poll conducted last year would, at first glance, lead people to believe that liberals are more immune from conspiracy theories; however, once the topics questioned are shown, it is clear that the conspiracy theories selected for the poll are all conservative-leaning in nature leading to a questionable outcome.8 For instance, a liberal-minded individual may be more inclined to believe that Russia has compromising information about former President Trump despite the fact that, by all accounts, this is a conspiracy theory that is lacking in any real evidence. In fact, which theories are believed may be impacted by the political party in power. Obviously, a liberal Democrat is less likely to believe in a conspiracy theory that calls into question their party’s virtue, just as conservatives are less likely to believe something that may reflect poorly on their ideologies.13 While we can not eliminate this bias completely, we must also be aware of it in order to avoid spreading our own misinformation even inadvertently. In order to help account for this, we have one theory that we speculate appeals more to conservatives, while the other might appeal more to a liberal mindset, as discussed in our treatments.
Conclusion & Why It Matters
The rise of misinformation has become a large threat to society and the stability of the government. There is some question as to how we got here. With the rise of access to the internet and the prominence of social media, there is some concern that society has an abundance of armchair experts without any real depth of knowledge. Finding a solution to the rise in conspiratorial thinking and finding ways to innoculate individuals against misinformation is paramount. Studies have been conducted, and possible solutions have been offered. The idea of preemptively making individuals aware of a conspiracy and the problems with it may prove effective.5 Understanding the false information before it has a chance to become widely accepted among younger and more impressionable individuals may prove key to dismantling some of the most dangerous false narratives. Understanding exactly which group is the most vulnerable to the disease of misinformation could tell us exactly where to begin combatting these false narratives. Indeed, preemptively broaching the subject may prove more effective than attempting to debunk the same conspiracy later on.5 It would be reasonable to look at individuals who take part in higher education as they already have educational opportunities to be better equipt to learn about and arm against misinformation.
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