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posted by martyb on Friday June 05 2020, @12:03AM   Printer-friendly
from the orly? dept.

FiveThirtyEight is covering the efficacy of fact-checking and other methods to combat the spread of misinformation and disinformation. Fact-checking, after the fact, is better than nothing, it turns out. There are some common factors in the times when it has been done successfully:

Political scientists Ethan Porter and Thomas J. Wood conducted an exhaustive battery of surveys on fact-checking, across more than 10,000 participants and 13 studies that covered a range of political, economic and scientific topics. They found that 60 percent of respondents gave accurate answers when presented with a correction, while just 32 percent of respondents who were not given a correction expressed accurate beliefs. That’s pretty solid proof that fact-checking can work.

But Porter and Wood have found, alongside many other fact-checking researchers, some methods of fact-checking are more effective than others. Broadly speaking, the most effective fact checks have this in common:

  1. They are from highly credible sources (with extra credit for those that are also surprising, like Republicans contradicting other Republicans or Democrats contradicting other Democrats).
  2. They offer a new frame for thinking about the issue (that is, they don’t simply dismiss a claim as “wrong” or “unsubstantiated”).
  3. They don’t directly challenge one’s worldview and identity.
  4. They happen early, before a false narrative gains traction.

It is as much about psychology as actually rebutting the disinformation because factors like partisanship and worldview have strong effects, and it is hard to reach people inside their social control media echo chambers from an accurate source they will accept.

[Though often incorrectly attributed to Mark Twain, one is reminded of the adage: “A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is still putting on its shoes”. --Ed.]

Previously:
(2020) Nearly Half of Twitter Accounts Pushing to Reopen America May be Bots
(2019) Russians Engaging in Ongoing 'Information Warfare,' FBI Director Says
(2019) How Fake News Spreads Like a Real Virus
(2019) More and More Countries are Mounting Disinformation Campaigns Online
(2019) At Defcon, Teaching Disinformation Campaigns Is Child's Play
(2018) Why You Stink at Fact-Checking
(2017) Americans Are “Under Siege” From Disinformation
(2015) Education Plus Ideology Exaggerates Rejection of Reality


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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 05 2020, @09:45PM (4 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 05 2020, @09:45PM (#1003972)

    From the article you linked:

    While there is a correlation between blacks and Hispanics and crime, the data imply a much stronger tie between poverty and crime than crime and any racial group, when gender is taken into consideration.[84] The direct correlation between crime and class, when factoring for race alone, is relatively weak. When gender, and familial history are factored, class correlates more strongly with crime than race or ethnicity.[86][87] Studies indicate that areas with low socioeconomic status may have the greatest correlation of crime with young and adult males, regardless of racial composition, though its effect on females is negligible.[86][87]

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 05 2020, @10:05PM (3 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 05 2020, @10:05PM (#1003977)

    Did not say crime was caused by race. There is a disparity that is measured differently by race that should be accounted for when trying to understand potentially violent confrontations with the police.

    There is a disparity in crime rates. Just like there is a disparity with "killed by cops". In the initial analysis the assumption "If bias against blacks didn't exist, you'd expect that 4.5 times more whites would be killed by cops." That doesn't control for violent crime rates that could impact "killed by cop" rates. I would argue that could explain the disparity you see in "killed by cops" more so than racism and simplistic population analysis.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 06 2020, @12:22AM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 06 2020, @12:22AM (#1004011)

      I'd say it was even more complicated than that.

      I'd argue that while skin color definitely plays a role, socioeconomic status plays an even bigger role.

      As to the original premise, it would be really interesting to see some research on ratios of different skin color (I won't use the term "race," as that implies that there is more than one species of sentient hominid on this planet -- and there is just the one -- Homo Sapiens) are implicated in police violence, broken down by reason for police interaction (shooting up a playground, robbing a liquor store, speeding, etc.) and injury profile.

      Unfortunately, at least in the US, we don't have good statistics about police violence. Although I'd argue that many people are injured/killed by police when there is no need to do so. As was the case with George Floyd and many, many others.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 06 2020, @12:53AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 06 2020, @12:53AM (#1004024)

        Mostly agree. I don't like the simplistic extrapolation on populations to explain complex social issues that are more adequately explained with additional factors.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 06 2020, @02:05PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 06 2020, @02:05PM (#1004197)

      The problem with relying on statistics is that the statistics are biased because the policing is biased. Do you have any evidence that doesn't come from statistics collected from agencies that selectively enforce the law that black people at the same socioeconomic level are more likely to be violent than whites?