This is Clearly Fake! Mis- and Disinformation Beliefs and the (Accurate) Recognition of Pseudo-Information—Evidence From the United States and the Netherlands

Abstract

To understand how beliefs about mis- and disinformation affect citizens’ (correct) classification of pseudo-information, this paper relies on an experimental survey study in the United States and the Netherlands in which we (a) measured mis- and disinformation attitudes, (b) exposed participants to a real versus fake article on immigration and criminality, and (c) compared classifications of mis- and disinformation in response to the real and fake news article. The main findings indicate that the veracity of information did not play a clear role in the attribution of mis- and disinformation. People with stronger mis- and disinformation beliefs, and people with incongruent prior attitudes, were most likely to classify information as false irrespective of the level of untruthfulness. These findings imply that beliefs about misinformation play a key role in the classification of information as false, whereas these beliefs do not contribute to the accuracy of veracity judgments.