Syracuse University SURFACE Dissertations - ALL SURFACE June 2019 Correcting Fear-arousing Disinformation on Social Media in the Spread of a Health Virus: A Focus on Situational Fear, Situational Threat Appraisal, Belief in Disinformation, and Intention to Spread Disinformation on Social Media Jiyoung Lee Syracuse University Follow this and additional works at: https://surface.syr.edu/etd Part of the Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons Recommended Citation Lee, Jiyoung, "Correcting Fear-arousing Disinformation on Social Media in the Spread of a Health Virus: A Focus on Situational Fear, Situational Threat Appraisal, Belief in Disinformation, and Intention to Spread Disinformation on Social Media" (2019). Dissertations - ALL. 1059. https://surface.syr.edu/etd/1059 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the SURFACE at SURFACE. It has been accepted for inclusion in Dissertations - ALL by an authorized administrator of SURFACE. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Abstract Disinformation is prevalent in the current social media environment and circulated just as quickly as truthful information. Research has investigated what motivates the spread of disinformation and how to combat it. However, limited research focuses on how fear- arousing disinformation during crises affects individuals’ belief in disinformation and to what extent corrective information can subdue the persuasive effects of fear-arousing disinformation. To address this gap, this research tests the effects of fear-arousing disinformation and different types of corrective information (i.e., no corrective information, simple corrective information, or narrative corrective information) on belief in disinformation and intentions to spread disinformation on social media, during a crisis—the spread of an unknown health virus. Furthermore, adapting the important roles of situational fear and threat appraisal in predicting people’s health behavioral changes, this research examines the underlying psychological mechanisms of fear and threat appraisal of a crisis in the effects of fear-arousing disinformation and different types of corrective information on belief in disinformation and intentions to spread disinformation on social media. Study 1 tests the interaction between fear-arousing disinformation and the presence of corrective information. Therefore, a 2 by 2 experiment was conducted in Study 1: disinformation (fear-neutral disinformation vs. fear-arousing disinformation) × corrective information (no corrective information vs. simple corrective information). Study 2 advances Study 1 by testing whether narrative corrective information decreases belief in disinformation. Study 2 conducted a 2 by 2 experiment (disinformation: fear-neutral disinformation vs. fear-arousing disinformation × corrective information: simple corrective information vs. narrative corrective information). A total of 419 data collected between January and February 2019 from Amazon MTurk were analyzed (205 for Study 1 and 214 for Study 2). The current research notes several key findings: 1) Fear-arousing disinformation does not make people believe the disinformation under risky situations and it can even make people avoid the disinformation content as a coping strategy when there is no corrective information presented. 2) Simple corrective information serves as an effective corrective information strategy when fear-neutral disinformation is shown but can backfire when fear- arousing disinformation is presented. 3) Corrective information that features individual narratives does not differ from simple alerts on their abilities to reduce misperceptions, situational fear, situational threat appraisal, and intentions to spread disinformation on social media. 4) Across individual differences, social media usage (i.e., social media use for news, social media use for fact-finding, and social media use for social interaction, health blog usage) emerges as significant factors that decide disinformation and corrective information processing. By testing effects of disinformation in terms of fear-arousal, which reflects a crisis of the spread of a health virus, this research addressed how fear-arousing disinformation and different forms of corrective information affect beliefs in disinformation and willingness to spread disinformation on social media, and how situational fear and situational threat appraisal may play their roles in the belief in disinformation mechanism. Keywords: fear-arousing disinformation, corrective information, narrative, threat appraisal, intentions to spread disinformation, health crisis, social media Correcting Fear-arousing Disinformation on Social Media in the Spread of a Health Virus: A Focus on Situational Fear, Situational Threat Appraisal, Belief in Disinformation, and Intention to Spread Disinformation on Social Media by Jiyoung Lee B.A., Ewha Womans University, 2014 M.A., Ewha Womans University, 2016 Dissertation Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Mass Communications. Syracuse University June 2019 Copyright © Jiyoung Lee 2019 All rights reserved Acknowledgements To my loved ones, families, and my supporters in academia. v Table of Contents Abstract ...................................................................................................................................... 1 Acknowledgements .................................................................................................................... v Table of Contents ...................................................................................................................... vi Tables ........................................................................................................................................ ix Figures........................................................................................................................................ x Chapter 1: Introduction .............................................................................................................. 1 Chapter 2: Literature Review ..................................................................................................... 7 Disinformation and Corrective Information .......................................................................... 7 Defining disinformation. .................................................................................................... 7 Disinformation on social media in crisis. .......................................................................... 8 Belief in disinformation and effects of corrective information........................................ 10 Narrative corrective information...................................................................................... 12 Moderating and Mediating Role of Fear at Disinformation and Situation .......................... 14 Situational threat appraisal and situational fear. .............................................................. 14 Fear-arousal in disinformation. ........................................................................................ 18 Intentions to Spread disinformation on Social Media.......................................................... 23 Moderating Role of Social Media Use................................................................................. 24 Summary of Theories and Connection to Current Research ............................................... 26 Chapter 3: Current Research .................................................................................................... 28 Research Question and Hypotheses for Study 1 .................................................................. 28 Research Question and Hypotheses for Study 2 .................................................................. 36 Overall Strategies ................................................................................................................. 43 Chapter 4: Study 1 ................................................................................................................... 45 Method ................................................................................................................................. 45 Design. ............................................................................................................................. 45 Participants. ...................................................................................................................... 45 Procedure. ........................................................................................................................ 46 Stimuli. ............................................................................................................................. 49 Measures. ......................................................................................................................... 50 Variable transformations .................................................................................................. 58 Statistical methodologies ................................................................................................. 59 Results .................................................................................................................................. 60 Manipulation check for disinformation. .......................................................................... 60 vi Manipulation check for corrective information ..............................................................