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Psychological Study Reveals Why Misinformation Is So Effective

An intriguing new study released last week in Psychological Science in the Public Interest reveals why people are more apt to believe false information being fed to them by the media and politicians.

According to the team of psychological scientists working on the study, led by Stephan Lewandowsky of the University of Western Australia, the main reason that people are more likely to believe false information (for example, that climate change is a hoax) is because it actually takes less brain power to believe a statement is false than to accept it as truth. Finding the truth takes time and effort that people often don’t care enough to spend on particular issues that aren’t of immediate concern.

A few excerpts from the report:

The main reason that misinformation is sticky, according to the researchers, is that rejecting information actually requires cognitive effort. Weighing the plausibility and the source of a message is cognitively more difficult than simply accepting that the message is true – it requires additional motivational and cognitive resources. If the topic isn’t very important to you or you have other things on your mind, misinformation is more likely to take hold.

And when we do take the time to thoughtfully evaluate incoming information, there are only a few features that we are likely to pay attention to: Does the information fit with other things I believe in? Does it make a coherent story with what I already know? Does it come from a credible source? Do others believe it?

Misinformation is especially sticky when it conforms to our preexisting political, religious, or social point of view. Because of this, ideology and personal worldviews can be especially difficult obstacles to overcome.

Even worse, efforts to retract misinformation often backfire, paradoxically amplifying the effect of the erroneous belief.
 

In the United States, we’ve seen several major misinformation campaigns over the years, perpetrated by both the media and politicians. Some of the most prominent campaigns include attempts to convince Americans that climate change is a hoax, that Saddam Hussein was somehow involved in the attacks of 9/11, and that President Barack Obama wasn’t born in America. To refute all of these claims by “leaders” would take time and research by individuals, which is often neglected. As the report explains, this is how these misinformation campaigns become successful.

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Video Evidence Helps Acquit Student in First Occupy Wall Street Trial

Alexander Arbuckle, the defendant in the first Occupy Wall Street case to go to trial, has been found not guilty after video of the incident he was involved in showed him breaking no laws. The Village Voice reports:

“The protesters, including Arbuckle, were in the street blocking traffic, Officer Elisheba Vera testified. The police, on the sidewalk, had to move in to make arrests to allow blocked traffic to move. But there was a problem with the police account: it bore no resemblance to photographs and videos taken that night.”

In an ironic twist, Arbuckle was actually working on a New York University photojournalism project aimed at defending police officers working at Occupy protests when he was arrested and charged with disorderly conduct.

“I felt the police had been treated unfairly on [sic] the media,” he said to the Village Voice. “All the focus was on the conflict and the worst instances of brutality and aggression, where most of the police I met down there were really professional and restrained.”

Occupy videographer and indefatigable live-streamer Tim Pool’s clip was used as evidence along with the NYPD’s own video footage in the trial. The video shows protesters clearly using the sidewalk like they were asked to. (Watch the arrest around minute 35 of Pool’s video.)

“What’s happening is very similar to what happened in 2004 with the Republican National Convention,” Arbuckle’s lawyer told theVoice. “It’s just a symptom of how the NYPD treats dissent.

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Phys.org — Is Media-Driven ‘Pseudo-Reality’ the Future of U.S. Politics: New University of Wisconsin-Madison Study Finds Misinformation Among Americans Remains Widespread

One in five Americans, for example, still believe that President Barack Obama is a Muslim, while almost seven in 10 Americans mistakenly thinkSarah Palin was the first to say “I can see Russia from my house.”

Obama is a Christian, of course, and the “seeing Russia from my house” quote originated from a “Saturday Night Live” skit with Tina Fey impersonating Sarah Palin.

“Politically, we may be moving more and more toward a world where our beliefs are shaped not by what is really true, but instead by the pseudo-realities created by talk shows and political pundits,” says Dietram A. Scheufele, the John E. Ross Professor of Life Sciences Communication at UW-Madison and an expert in public opinion research.

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The Science of Fox News

This is an excerpt from Chris Mooney’s new bookThe Republican Brain: The Science of Why They Deny Science and Reality.

The evidence is clear, then—the Politifact-Stewart flap notwithstanding, Fox viewers are the most misinformed. But then comes the truly interesting and important question: Whyis that the case?

To answer it, we’ll first need to travel back to the 1950s, and the pioneering work of the Stanford psychologist and cult infiltrator, Leon Festinger.

In his 1957 book A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance, Festinger built on his famous study of a doomsday cult called the Seekers, and other research, to lay out many ramifications of his core idea about why human beings contort the evidence to fit their beliefs, rather than conforming those beliefs to the evidence. That included a prediction about how those who are highly committed to a belief or view should go about seeking information that touches on that powerful conviction.

Festinger suggested that once we’ve settled on a core belief, this ought to shape how we gather information. More specifically, we are likely to try to avoid encountering claims and information that challenge that belief, because these will create cognitive dissonance. Instead, we should go looking for information thataffirms the belief. The technical (and less than ideal) term for this phenomenon is “selective exposure”: what it means is that we selectively choose to be exposedto information that is congenial to our beliefs, and to avoid “inconvenient truths” that are uncongenial to them.

If Festinger’s ideas about “selective exposure” are correct, then the problem with Fox News may not solely be that it is actively causing its viewers to be misinformed. It’s very possible that Fox could be imparting misinformation even as politically conservative viewers are also seeking the station out—highly open to it and already convinced about many falsehoods that dovetail with their beliefs. Thus, they would come into the encounter with Fox not only misinformed and predisposed to become more so, but inclined to be very confident about their incorrect beliefs and to impart them to others. In this account, political misinformation on the right would be driven by a kind of feedback loop, with both Fox and its viewers making the problem worse.

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Unmasking of Fake Union Organizer Offers Glimpse of Conservative “Sting” Efforts

Want a peek into the dirty tricks of the right-wing activists who stitch together phony “exposés” and doctored videos like the one the late Andrew Brietbart used to attack former U.S. Department of Agriculture official Shirley Sherrod? The so-called investigations then fed a firestorm of outrage among Fox News, the Drudge Report and right-wing lawmakers.   

Michael Powell offers “an anatomy of a political sting” that took place at an East Harlem community organizing group. It included an elaborate website and fake Facebook page with a detailed, but phony, biography.

 A “young, bearded and a bit scruffy” man who said his name was Melvin Howtig walked into the office wanting to know how to form a union at the environmental company where he worked.

After a few questions, he had one more, writes Powell in The New York Times. “If he formed a union, could his fellow workers join with the employer to shake down politicians for more money?”

At this point, Rhea Byer-Ettinger, an organizer for Manhattan Together, felt her internal baloney detector go on red alert. “Beep, beep, beep,” she said. “I said to him: ‘Well, that’s not how we work. Tell me, why are you asking me about that?’ ”

Click here for the full, fascinating and just a bit frightening story.

source

Right-Wing Media Still In Denial About Limbaugh Debacle And Contraception Battle

Rush Limbaugh’s trademark misogyny continues to haunt the Republican Party, but conservative pundits refuse to acknowledge that unpleasant truth. Instead, many Obama critics insist the recent political battle over contraception, in tandem with Rush Limbaugh’s three-day verbal assault on Sandra Fluke, hasn’t really hurt the GOP. In fact, it might have even helped.

What are partisans conveniently ignoring? The recent avalanche of good-news polling for Democrats, specifically the mounting evidence that the gender gap is accelerating at an alarming rate for Republicans.  

That’s Limbaugh legacy so far this year. But his fans don’t dare admit it. 

It was the Wall Street Journal’s Peggy Noonan who was out front last week leading the GOP’s denial brigade. Obama’s supposed political woes, she announced, began in January when the White House announced its (popular) decision to require church-affiliated organizations to provide health insurance plans that cover contraceptives for women. (In February, Noonan suggested Obama may have lost his re-election bid based solely on his handling of the issue.)

In her recent column, Noonan was sure she heard the “public reaction” to Obama’s handling of the initiative:

“You’re kidding me. That’s not just bad judgment and a lack of civic tact, it’s not even constitutional!”

Note those quotation marks are basically air quotes. Meaning, Noonan simply made up the quote, which reflected her own reaction to the contraception question, and suggested it mirrored a broader feeling about how Obama’s contraception policy left a “sour taste” with Americans, and Catholics in particular.

Public polling released last month suggests otherwise:

Nearly two-thirds of Americans favor President Barack Obama’s policy requiring birth control coverage for female employees, including clear majorities of Roman Catholic, Protestant evangelical and independent voters, a poll showed on Thursday.

…

Senate Republicans have staked their fate on a religious liberty argument calculated to resonate with conservative Catholics and like-minded voters in important political swing states, including Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania.

But the data suggest an uphill struggle, with 60 percent of Catholics and 57 percent of Evangelicals favoring Obama’s policy.

And that’s not even a new finding. A similar poll from 2009 revealed 63 percent of American Catholics already supported health care coverage for birth control. 

Over at the stridently anti-Obama website Power Line, a blogger announced Rush Limbaugh’s “slut” and “prostitute” contraception controversy had been “trumped up” by liberals and had actually boomeranged, contributing to Obama’s “terrible” and “very bad” month of March. That assessment differed dramatically from the majority of Americans who thought Limbaugh should have been fired for his extended, sexist smear on Fluke.

Meanwhile, contrary to the far-right claim from Noonan and others, there’s no indication the fight over contraception has hurt Obama or Democrats. There is however, ample evidence it has helped them this year.

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A very interesting insight into how certain hidden companies hire individuals to derail discussions, push political propaganda and specific views on the Internet - and their methods of doing so.

lagoble:

abaldwin360:

I came across this post on reddit, I have no idea how much truth there is to it or if it’s purely fiction, but I found it interesting.  

Basically, it’s interesting because I have noticed how a lot of right-leaning comments on news stories and posts on message boards seem to hit the same exact points over and over again and have similar tones.  

I always chalked it up to repeating Fox News and Conservative radio talking points and similar types of of people being drawn to a particular political ideology. 

It’s a good read, and gave me something to think about. I just wish there was more evidence of this actually happening.

I wouldn’t be surprised. I’ve read (and am too lazy to look up the reference, sorry) that this happens in China and N. Korea - that the govts hire people to comment on news stories - that if the same mantra is repeated enough that individuals think they are the odd ones out and something is wrong with them…. so they start parroting the party lines too. Classic brainwashing techniques anyone?? Religions do this as well.

Yeah, it’s funny. I used to frequent message boards a lot, and when there would be a political or religious debate, the conservatives would all jump in and dogpile anyone arguing from a liberal stand point, focus in on a very small part of their argument and berate them for being a “loony liberal” or some other such “catch phrase”.

They also always seemed very fond of ad-hominem and guilt by association-type arguments.  

A very interesting insight into how certain hidden companies hire individuals to derail discussions, push political propaganda and specific views on the Internet - and their methods of doing so.

I came across this post on reddit, I have no idea how much truth there is to it or if it’s purely fiction, but I found it interesting.  

Basically, it’s interesting because I have noticed how a lot of right-leaning comments on news stories and posts on message boards seem to hit the same exact points over and over again and have similar tones.  

I always chalked it up to repeating Fox News and Conservative radio talking points and similar types of of people being drawn to a particular political ideology. 

It’s a good read, and gave me something to think about. I just wish there was more evidence of this actually happening.

Newt Gingrich’s PR director makes over 60 changes to candidate’s Wikipedia page

Joe DeSantis, Newt Gingrich’s communications director, has come under fire for making significant changes to Gingrich’s Wikipedia page, CNN Political Ticker reported Monday.

According to Wikipedia records, DeSantis has made or requested over 60 alterations to Wikipedia’s biographical entry on Gingrich.

The communications director has also made changes to Gingrich’s wife Callista’s page on the online crowd-sourced encyclopedia, adjusting her entry at least 23 times since 2008, according to BuzzFeed.

DeSantis has requested changes to the GOP presidential candidate’s page through a feature on the site called “Talk” since May 2011, most recently asking for adjustments in mid-December.

DeSantis has drawn criticism from some Wikipedia editors.

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League of Women Voters: 5 Myths About Voter Impersonation

manicchill:

MYTH: Voter impersonation is a widespread problem.
FACT:Between 2002 and 2007, after undertaking a massive investigation into voting irregularities, the U.S. Justice Department did not prosecute a single individual for impersonating another voter at the polls.

MYTH: Third party registration drives contribute to voter impersonation.
FACT: Since 2008, only 31 cases of suspected voter impersonation have been reported to Florida authorities. But due to a restrictive new law there, the League has been forced to suspend its Florida voter registration activities for the first time in 72 years.

MYTH: Everyone either has an ID or can easily obtain one.
FACT: 11 percent of eligible voters or about 21 million people, don’t have updated, state-issued photo IDs. Furthermore, most states require producing a passport or birth certificate to get one. This presents a tremendous burden for people who work multiple jobs, lack transportation, have disabilities, live outside the state they were born, are poor or elderly.

MYTH: Election Day registration invites voter impersonation.
FACT: An investigation by the Secretary of State in Maine – which was the first state to adopt Election Day registration – did not find evidence of voting irregularities due to same day registration.

MYTH: Early voting increases voter impersonation.
FACT: Incidents of impersonation in early voting are just as rare as they are in Election Day balloting. A CBS News report on 17 early voting states revealed no widespread signs of irregularities in the 2008 election.

Hit the jump for more on the these myths, including sources.

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