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You don’t have to tell a story! A registered report testing the effectiveness of narrative versus non-narrative misinformation corrections
- Source :
- Cognitive Research, Vol 5, Iss 1, Pp 1-26 (2020), Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications
- Publication Year :
- 2020
- Publisher :
- SpringerOpen, 2020.
-
Abstract
- Misinformation often has an ongoing effect on people’s memory and inferential reasoning even after clear corrections are provided; this is known as the continued influence effect. In pursuit of more effective corrections, one factor that has not yet been investigated systematically is the narrative versus non-narrative format of the correction. Some scholars have suggested that a narrative format facilitates comprehension and retention of complex information and may serve to overcome resistance to worldview-dissonant corrections. It is, therefore, a possibility that misinformation corrections are more effective if they are presented in a narrative format versus a non-narrative format. The present study tests this possibility. We designed corrections that are either narrative or non-narrative, while minimizing differences in informativeness. We compared narrative and non-narrative corrections in three preregistered experiments (totalN = 2279). Experiment 1 targeted misinformation contained in fictional event reports; Experiment 2 used false claims commonly encountered in the real world; Experiment 3 used real-world false claims that are controversial, in order to test the notion that a narrative format may facilitate corrective updating primarily when it serves to reduce resistance to correction. In all experiments, we also manipulated test delay (immediate vs. 2 days), as any potential benefit of the narrative format may only arise in the short term (if the story format aids primarily with initial comprehension and updating of the relevant mental model) or after a delay (if the story format aids primarily with later correction retrieval). In all three experiments, it was found that narrative corrections are no more effective than non-narrative corrections. Therefore, while stories and anecdotes can be powerful, there is no fundamental benefit of using a narrative format when debunking misinformation.
- Subjects :
- Continued influence effect
Hydrolases
Experimental psychology
Cognitive Neuroscience
050801 communication & media studies
Experimental and Cognitive Psychology
Resistance (psychoanalysis)
lcsh:Consciousness. Cognition
050105 experimental psychology
False accusation
Narrative processing
0508 media and communications
Humans
0501 psychology and cognitive sciences
Narrative
Misinformation
Problem Solving
Narration
Communication
05 social sciences
lcsh:BF309-499
Test (assessment)
Term (time)
Comprehension
Stories
Psychology
Registered Reports and Replication
Myth debunking
Cognitive psychology
Subjects
Details
- Language :
- English
- ISSN :
- 23657464
- Volume :
- 5
- Issue :
- 1
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- Cognitive Research
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi.dedup.....3a8b54aef4f6b5ed94d811bf59c90679