Happy second week of the semester students!
We hope that you are settling into your new classes and that you are staying on track with your assignments. As the semester marches on, we understand that it can be daunting to determine which sources are reliable for your research. With access to thousands of books, articles, journals, and videos, it can be hard to sift through what is considered credible and where the author collected their information from. With that in mind, we are here to break down what misinformation is, where it comes from, and how to identify it, so that you can be certain of the legitimacy of the works that you use for your classes.
WHAT IS MISINFORMATION?
Misinformation can be characterized by information that is misleading or inaccurate, but which is positioned to be seen as true. Unlike disinformation, which is false information that is created to deliberately deceive and harm its audience, misinformation is often exhibited as unintentionally spreading information that has not been validated. Satirical sites such as the Onion or the Babylon Bee, while created to trick their readers, often borderlines the line of being misinformation (or disinformation) due to its nature to overly exaggerate and openly express its own falsehoods for the sake of humor. However, as much of satire relies on its audience to make this connection on their own, especially as much of the genre is self-referential to actual case studies of misinformation, the context can become lost. As one of these articles circulates throughout the news cycle, it can be hard to find the original source and to not consider it as truth, making it turn into misinformation. This is especially true if someone recognizes that a work is intended to be satirical and reframes it to be viewed as fact, thus generating further confusion and creating disinformation instead.
Examples of misinformation:
WHERE DOES MISINFORMATION COME FROM?
Misinformation can come from a variety of sources. In some instances, misinformation originally started as actual facts which became harder to recall as the information was spread to more and more people. In other cases, misinformation can reveal inherent biases present in our culture, whether we are aware of them or not. As outlined in the Scientific American article, Biases Make People More Suspectable to Misinformation Spread by Social Media, our social networks can also influence our channel of information as we inherently trust those closest to us, developing an "echo chamber," which can be hard to remove ourselves from.
With the surge of generative AI becoming a part of our daily lives, it is becoming increasingly harder to determine fact from fiction. While the platforms are theoretically designed to gather the most credible sources when creating a response, it has been frequently proven that these engines are just as suspectable to misinformation as their human counterparts. Even with a variety of new regulations and safety guards being instated, users are consistently finding ways to bypass these barriers. A recent study conducted by researchers at the University of Sydney found that by prompting AI Chatbots to create a "simulation" of social media posts which spread political misinformation, that the AI would generate the posts if the user asserted that the posts were only mock examples and would not be actually used. This is only just one example of how manipulating the verbiage of prompts can skirt around these supposed barriers.
HOW DO YOU IDENTIFY MISINFORMATION?
There are multiple methods that can be used to identify misinformation, with many scholars having come together to create their own methods. For this case, we will be using the SIFT Method, developed by digital literacy expert, Mike Caulfield. His methodology follows four steps and emphasizes the need to take a pause before sharing out any information that you have not yet verified.
What other information do you know about this topic?
We hope that this has helped you get a better understanding of the topic of misinformation and will ensure that you find the most reliable sources for your courses!
However, if you are still needing a little extra help, you can always book an appointment with one of our librarians.
We wish you all have a great second week and we look forward to helping you with all your information needs for many weeks to come!
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