What is the problem?
The COVID-19 pandemic increased the amount of time that people spend online and their exposure to digital contents and communications. One of the effects of the rapid digitalisation of everyday activities is the increase of disinformation spreading online. The 2018 Eurobarometer no. 464 revealed that most European citizens, among them Spanish people (88%), consider disinformation a problem as they (66%) come across false information at least once a week (Eurobarometer 503, 2020). Recent studies identify a relationship between the proliferation of disinformation and the spreading of conspiracy theories (IPSOS, December 2020). Conspiracy theories are distinct from other forms of disinformation: they offer easy understandable explanations of important events by claiming that secret plots orchestrated by powerful people or malevolent groups were responsible for those events ( Goertzel, 1994, Douglas, 2023). International organisations such as UNESCO alert about their negative impact: “conspiracy theories cause real harm to people, to their health, and also to their physical safety” (UNESCO, 2020).
How AI could help to combat disinformation?
The development of systems that can automatically detect false information and prevent its propagation is very challenging since information can be manipulated in several different ways to confuse the readers. Still, a good amount of research has been done in the automatic detection of disinformation (Montoro-Montarroso et al., 2023). One of the most important sources of information for the systems can be extracted from the content of the news article, but in this case, it is essential to distinguish divergent or critical thinking from conspiracy theories, as the former enriches public debate while the latter seeks to jeopardise public debate. The new phenomenon in relation with conspiracy theories is that they have spilled over the social boundaries of those minorities that have traditionally adopted this worldview.
Which are the aims of this project?
The goal of the project is to provide relevant knowledge to public and private actors to deal with disinformation processes in general and in particular in the field of health. For this purpose, the project goals are the following:
Goal 1. Describe the mechanisms of persuasive communication in conspiracy theories and identify strategies to minimise the impact of disinformation on individuals and societies.
Goal 2. Examine and map how the spillover effect of disinformation occurs and how this phenomenon increases social vulnerability to disinformation among special groups of the population.
Goal 3. Develop mechanisms for early alert in order to contain the spillover effect of disinformation in a particular moment.
Goal 4. Empower the general public, with a special emphasis on young people, to identify the toxic nature and poor quality of health information content.
References
Goertzel, T. (1994). Belief in conspiracy theories. Political Psychology, 15, 731–742.
Douglas, K. M., & Sutton, R. M. (2023). What are conspiracy theories? a definitional approach to their correlates, consequences, and communication. Annual Review of Psychology, 74(1), 271-298. Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-psych-032420-031329
IPSOS (2020). More than 1 in 3 Americans believe a ‘deep state’ is working to undermine Trump. https://www.ipsos.com/en-us/news-polls/npr-misinformation-123020
Montoro-Montarroso , A., Cantón-Correa, J., Rosso, P., Chulvi, B., Panizo-Lledot, Ángel, Huertas-Tato, J., Calvo-Figueras, B., Rementeria, M. J., & Gómez-Romero, J. (2023). Fighting disinformation with artificial intelligence: fundamentals, advances and challenges. Profesional De La información, 32(3).https://doi.org/10.3145/epi.2023.may.22https://revista.profesionaldelainformacion.com/index.php/EPI/article/view/87328
UNESCO (2020). #ThinkBeforeSharing - Stop the spread of conspiracy theories. https://en.unesco.org/themes/gced/thinkbeforesharing