Why Fact-Checking on Social Media is Largely Ineffective - Leah Bader

By Leah Bader

This past October, former Facebook employee Frances Haugen testified before a Senate committee that the algorithm utilized by Facebook actively promotes divisive content. In the wake of this testimony, Facebook launched a rebranding campaign and lawmakers vowed to hold social media platforms responsible for the political division and misinformation their algorithms perpetuate. While levels of divisions division over policy has remained constant, animosity across party lines has grown, with many signs pointing toward social media algorithms and misinformation spread as its driver. In the wake of the shift of news media to social media platforms, questions remain as to what the root issues of misinformation spread are, and how policy can address them.  

Due to a national decrease in trust of mainstream media, people have been moving away from traditional news sources and towards political figures and social media sites to get their information. This decrease was largely induced by political rhetoric and contributed to the decentralization of news sources for many Americans, as they no longer depend on one news program for information. It’s become easier for individuals to take on the role of a news source as decentralization shapes social media into the new home of American daily news. Today, more than 53% of Americans get their news through social media, which has changed the way in which people engage politically with information.

 When people exposed to online media engage in online political content and articulate their own political opinions, they are more likely to engage in offline political action.  Additionally, university students who engage in political media--sharing it with their friends and family or reaching out to politicians online--have increased political efficacy and are more likely to take politically informed action offline. The mobilizing power of social media and thus the potential impact of misinformation spread is large. One way that tech companies seek to diminish political division and their responsibility for it is by providing fact-checking on their platforms. However, fact-checking methods often ignore psychological aspects of social media usage that erode its effectiveness.

Confirmation bias

            Confirmation bias describes a psychological theory that people are more likely to accept evidence that affirms their prior-held beliefs than contradicts them. This psychological theory posits that people seek out and accept ideas that confirm their prior beliefs as a way to solidify self-identity and avoid cognitive dissonance. In this capacity, interacting with politics through social media has not only mobilizing consequences, but results in strong conceptualizations of identity. Additionally, people may avoid or distrust fact-checking if it contradicts their prior-held beliefs, even if these beliefs are grounded in misinformation. 

Relationship between social media and mental state

Studies on the impact of social media on mental state have found a correlation between the use of social media and increases in anxiety and depression, as well as associations between the amount of daily social media use and dispositional anxiety symptoms. In the wake of a stressful year, exposure to COVID-19 related media has a demonstrated positive correlation with unspecific anxiety and depression.  In turn, mental state has the capability to drive social media consumption, as anxiety increases the likelihood that individuals will engage in motivated information selectivity. Thus, social media provides a powerful platform to engage in information selectivity, with fact-checking seen as less credible when individuals engage in an unbalanced survey of information.

These psychological elements of social media use impact the effectiveness of fact-checking in combating misinformation. In light of these psychological elements, it’s understandable that the most effective fact-checking tactics are ones that don’t directly challenge narratives that people view as foundational to their identities or worldviews. Additionally, fact-checking that discounts misinformation without offering context or explanation is often perceived as less credible than the misinformation itself.

The H.R. 8636 Bill is one of the recent legislative attempts to combat misinformation and aims to address harmful algorithms on social media platforms. While bipartisan support for limiting the power of tech and social media companies is strong, there is ongoing disagreement about how exactly this should be done, highlighting the underlying political divide. As fact-checking demonstrates limited effectiveness, there is a clear need for legislation that holds social media platforms accountable and addresses psychological elements of social media consumption to minimize the spread of misinformation. Additionally, as Frances Haugen articulated, fact-checking may be limited as the algorithms that determine news and information exposure on social media platforms may be the root of the issue.

Trends of decentralization of information sharing, the insidious underlying psychological impacts of social media, and the lack of a strong bipartisan policy on domestic misinformation spread have led to today’s misinformation crisis on social media. It’s evident that lawmakers must hold social media platforms accountable, and that fact-checking is very unlikely to mitigate misinformation spread and political division on social platforms. If the October Senate testimony taught us anything, it’s that legislation based in the psychology of social media must be passed to hold companies accountable for the damage caused by harmful algorithms and ineffective fact-checking.