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Infodemics: Do healthcare professionals detect corona-related false news stories better than students?

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  • Gruener, Sven
  • Krüger, Felix

Abstract

False news stories cause welfare losses and fatal health consequences. To limit its dissemination, it is essential to know what determines the ability to distinguish between true and false news stories. In our experimental study, we present the subjects corona-related stories taken from the media from various categories (e.g. social isolation, economic consequences, direct health consequences, and “bullshit”). The task is to evaluate the stories as true or false. Besides students with and without healthcare background, we recruit healthcare professionals to increase the external validity of our study. Our main findings are: (i) Healthcare professionals perform similar to students in correctly distinguishing between true and false news stories. (ii) The propensity to engage in analytical thinking and actively open-minded thinking is positively associated with the ability to distinguish between true and false. (iii) We find that the residence of the subjects (East- or West-Germany) plays only a minor role. (iv) If narratives contradict the content of a story, subjects tend to think that the stories are wrong.

Suggested Citation

  • Gruener, Sven & Krüger, Felix, 2020. "Infodemics: Do healthcare professionals detect corona-related false news stories better than students?," SocArXiv 86j5v_v1, Center for Open Science.
    • Handle: RePEc:osf:socarx:86j5v_v1
    DOI: 10.31219/osf.io/86j5v_v1
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