An Examination of Factors Contributing to the Acceptance of Online Health Misinformation

Wenjing Pan; Diyi Liu; Jie Fang

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2021.630268

An Examination of Factors Contributing to the Acceptance of Online Health Misinformation

Front Psychol. 2021 Mar 1:12:630268. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.630268. eCollection 2021.

Authors

Wenjing Pan¹, Diyi Liu¹, Jie Fang¹

Affiliation

¹ Journalism Department, School of Journalism and Communication, Renmin University of China, Beijing, China.

Abstract

This study examined factors including health-related anxiety, preexisting misinformation beliefs, and repeated exposure contributing to individuals' acceptance of health misinformation. Through a large-scale online survey, this study found that health-related anxiety was positively associated with health misinformation acceptance. Preexisting misinformation beliefs, as well as repeated exposure to health misinformation, were both positively associated with health misinformation acceptance. The results also showed that demographic variables were significantly associated with health misinformation acceptance. In general, females accepted more health misinformation compared to males. Participants' age was negatively associated with health misinformation acceptance. Participants' education level and income were both negatively associated with their acceptance of health misinformation.

Keywords: health misinformation; health-related anxiety; misinformation acceptance; preexisting misinformation beliefs; repeated exposure; social media.