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Research has shown that laypeople tend to rely on their own evaluations when encountering scientific text information that is easy to comprehend. This easiness effect of science popularization leaves them vulnerable to uncritically accepting misinformation presented in a simplified manner. The present study investigated whether warnings of misinformation frequently used in social networks and other online services mitigate or even prevent the persuasive advantage of information easiness. Forty-one medical laypeople read brief argumentative online texts proposing fictitious health claims. Texts were either easy or difficult to comprehend, and they either were or were not labeled with a warning that independent fact-checkers dispute the information. Results showed that warnings effectively increased laypeople's skepticism toward scientific misinformation. However, findings also suggested that warnings do not reduce the persuasive advantage of misinformation presented in an easily understandable manner, pointing to the limits of this communicative tool.

Text comprehension involves the ability to understand how texts relate to the situation they describe and to each other (i.e., a Document model). Research into Document models has emphasized the role of information sources in structuring readers' mental models of situations. The present article reviews research on source comprehension and examines new hypotheses regarding source encoding during text comprehension. Two experiments examined college students' evaluation and recognition of two embedded sources as a function of the consistency of their statements (Experiments 1 and 2) and the demands of the reading task (Experiment 2). Sources were introduced either with a knowledge feature (e.g., how the source knew what they knew) or a control feature. Readers were more likely to select the knowledgeable source as more competent and to justify their selection by referring to the knowledge feature (Experiment 1). Experiment 2 found that readers' preference for knowledgeable sources was stronger when the content statements were discrepant. Preference for knowledgeable sources was also stronger when the task focused on source knowledge, as compared to a control evaluation task or a baseline reading task. The source knowledge evaluation task distinctively enhanced participants' integration of the source designations with their respective statements, as compared to the control and baseline conditions. Results are discussed in light of current theories of single and multiple document comprehension.

Due to the increasing educational use of the Internet, children in elementary school need to critically evaluate source information to judge the trustworthiness of information. Studies with adult readers show that sourcing prompts and mutually exclusive claims in reading materials promote the use of source information. However, little is known about how these facilitating factors affect early readers. Therefore, we investigated to what extent a sourcing prompt and mutually exclusive claims in reading materials influence elementary students' use of source information when completing a multiple documents task. Results reveal that a sourcing prompt enhances source citations but not source evaluations or memory for source-content links. Students reading mutually exclusive claims more often adhere to the position of a trustworthy source but do not include more source references into their written task products.

Scientific claims that are connected to ethical concerns are frequently brought forward by communicators who are not ethically neutral. This study investigated how far recipients' evaluation of such claims is guided by vigilance toward a potential ethical source bias rather than their own ethical bias. One hundred ten individuals opposed to capital punishment read a topic-related text by an ethically positioned source. A scientific claim in the text either supported or did not support the recipient's ethical stance; in addition, the source either shared or opposed their stance. Results showed that recipients are guided to some extent by their own ethically motivated reasoning: They agree more consistently with sources sharing their ethical stance and consider these sources to be more credible. Recipients appear to be principally aware that a source's ethical stance may bias its scientific message, but this vigilance seems to depend on their own ethical disagreement with the source.

Most students profit from the easy accessibility of onlineinformation, but specific competencies for successful reading onthe internet are seldom taught during class. Therefore, studentsmight not be able to choose credible information autonomously.Empirical evidence suggests that high school students hardlyevaluate the credibility of sources (“sourcing”) when readingmultiple documents. Consequently, effective interventions whichfoster sourcing skills are needed. This study evaluates the effectsof a written instruction designed to augment sourcing activities in amultiple document reading task by inducing epistemic vigilance.The written instruction introduces the concept of the division ofcognitive labor and informs about low editorial control on theinternet. In comparison to a control group, students receiving theinstruction prior to completing an internet research task showedmore attention to, evaluation of, and memory for sources

In two experiments, undergraduate students read short texts containing two embedded sources that could either agree or disagree with each other. Participants' memory for the sources' identity (i.e., occupation) and features (i.e., the source's access to knowledge and the source's physical appearance) was examined as a function of the consistency of their assertions. In Experiment 1 (n = 64), sources were described with only one feature (knowledge or appearance), whereas in Experiment 2 (n = 62), each source was described with both features. Experiment 1 additionally tested the influence of two different tasks during reading (an evaluation of sources' knowledgeability vs. an evaluation of sources' age). Consistent with our predictions, knowledge evaluations (Experiment 1) and discrepant claims (Experiments 1 and 2) enhanced memory for sources and their features. Experiment 2 also showed that when both types of features were available, discrepant claims selectively benefited memory for a source's knowledgeability over appearance.

We present an empirical investigation of a classroom training fostering vocational students' consideration of source information when deciding about science-based controversies. The training was specifically aimed at raising students' awareness of the division of cognitive labor and the resulting need to take a source's competence into account when deciding whom to trust. Data were collected from a training group and a waiting list control group in a pretest-posttest design. The results show that students benefitted from the training in terms of their inclination to agree with pertinent expert sources rather than low-pertinent experts and to refer to the source of information to justify their judgment. Source memory was not affected by the training.

Scientific texts are a genre in which adherence to specific discourse conventions allows for conclusions on the scientific integrity of the information and thus on its validity. This study examines whether genre-typical features of scientific discourse influence how laypeople handle conflicting science-based knowledge claims. In two experiments with a total of N?=?120 participants we investigated to what extent laypeople take into account such features when judging the "scientificness" and credibility of conflicting knowledge claims about medical issues and issues related to climate change and when determining their personal agreement with conflicting claims. Results showed that laypeople use genre-typical discourse features to evaluate the scientificness and credibility of conflicting science-based information. However, depending on the scientific topic, they appear to distinguish between what they judge to be credible and what they personally believe to be true. Educational implications of the findings are discussed.

Well-educated laypeople tend to rely on their own ability to evaluate scientific claims when they obtain information from texts with high comprehensibility. The present study investigated whether controversial content reduces this facilitating effect of high text comprehensibility on readers' self-reliance and whether the influence of comprehensibility and controversiality is mediated by perceived epistemic topic complexity. Eighty-eight students of non medical subjects read medical texts of varying comprehensibility and controversiality and indicated their willingness to rely on their own judgment. Participants' reliance on their own judgment was indicated by persuasion and confidence in claim agreement. The results showed that recipients' reliance was stronger after reading comprehensible rather than incomprehensible texts, but this difference was larger if texts were uncontroversial rather than controversial. These effects, however, were not mediated by perceived epistemic topic complexity. Implications for the communication of scientific knowledge to the lay public are discussed.

Past research has shown that readers often fail to notice conflicts in text. In our present study we investigated whether accessing information from multiple documents instead of a single document might alleviate this problem by motivating readers to integrate information. We further tested whether this effect would be moderated by source expertise. One hundred undergraduates read the same medical information purportedly written by either medical experts or laypeople, which was presented as one document or spread across four documents. Results revealed partial support for our hypotheses. Readers of multiple documents exhibited superior memory for conflicts and provided a more balanced description of conflicting information in essays they wrote. Variation of author expertise moderated the effect of presentation format in the essay task but not on the memory test. The results extend previous research by showing that multiple documents reading also stimulates the integration of "conflicting" information. (Contains 2 tables and 1 footnote.)

The focus of this special section is on the processes involved when solving information-based problems. Solving these problems requires from people that they are able to define the information problem, search and select usable and reliable sources and information and synthesise information into a coherent body of knowledge. An important aspect throughout the whole search process is the critical evaluation of sources and information. Evaluation processes are of particular importance when searching information on the Internet, because of the masses of information, and the open publication principle of the Internet. The articles in the present special section take different perspectives in studying the evaluation processes. Influencing factors such as students' domain-specific prior knowledge, metatextual knowledge, and students' epistemic beliefs are addressed.

The present study investigated how dealing with conflicting versus consistent medical information on the Web impacts on topic-specific and medicine-related epistemic beliefs as well as aspects of health decision making. One hundred mostly female university students were randomly assigned to three groups. Two intervention groups searched the Web for information on cholesterol to advise a fictitious friend about treatment. Pre-selected websites for these groups provided either conflicting or consistent information. The third group, the control group, did not conduct Web search. Results showed that the intervention groups differed in topic-specific epistemic beliefs. After the Web search, their medicine-related epistemic beliefs were more advanced while remaining unchanged in controls. The intervention groups also differed in some aspects of decision making. (Contains 4 tables.)

Drawing on the theory of documents representation (Perfetti et al., Toward a theory of documents representation. In: H. v. Oostendorp & S. R. Goldman (Eds.), "The construction of mental representations during reading." Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum, 1999), we argue that successfully dealing with multiple documents on the World Wide Web requires readers to form documents models; that is, to form a representation of contents "and" sources. We present a study in which we tested the assumption that the use of metacognitive strategies is crucial to the formation of documents models. A total of 100 participants with little medical knowledge were asked to conduct an Internet research on a medical topic. Participants were randomly assigned to four experimental groups that received different types of metacognitive prompts: participants either received evaluation prompts, monitoring prompts, both types of prompts, or no prompts. A control group took paper-and-pencil notes. Results showed that laypersons receiving evaluation prompts outperformed controls in terms of knowledge about sources and produced more arguments relating to the source of information when justifying credibility judgments. However, laypersons receiving evaluation prompts were not better able to indicate the source of information after Internet research than controls. In addition, laypersons receiving monitoring prompts acquired significantly more knowledge about facts, and performed slightly better on a comprehension test. It is concluded that the results underline the importance of metacognition in dealing with multiple documents.