Accepted for/Published in: Journal of Medical Internet Research
Date Submitted: Aug 21, 2023
Open Peer Review Period: Aug 21, 2023 - Sep 5, 2023
Date Accepted: Jul 1, 2024
(closed for review but you can still tweet)
Evaluating Reality in Social Media: A Multi-Dimensional Approach for Mitigating Misinformation and Enhancing Digital Literacy for Public Health
ABSTRACT
Background:
The binary classification of fake vs. fact may not capture the range of schemas that users employ to evaluate social media content. A more comprehensive understanding of user evaluation schemas is necessary.
Objective:
The goal of this research is to advance the current understanding of user evaluation of social media information and to develop and initially validate a measurement instrument for assessing social media realism.
Methods:
This study used mixed methods, including qualitative focus groups (N=48) and a quantitative survey involving current social media-using adults (N=442), to examine the schemas that people use to judge the connection between social media content and reality.
Results:
The findings show that social media-reality evaluation involves five dimensions including falsity, naturality, authenticity, resonance, and social assurance. These dimensions were differentially mapped onto patterns of social media use. These results provide preliminary validity data for the Social Media-Reality Measure, which encompasses multiple evaluation schemas for social media content.
Conclusions:
The identification of divergent schemas expands the current focus beyond fake and fact, while the goals, contexts, and outcomes of social media use associated with these schemas can guide future digital media literacy efforts. Specifically, the Social Media-Reality Measure can be utilized in developing tailored digital media literacy interventions for addressing diverse public health issues.
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Copyright
© The authors. All rights reserved. This is a privileged document currently under peer-review/community review (or an accepted/rejected manuscript). Authors have provided JMIR Publications with an exclusive license to publish this preprint on it's website for review and ahead-of-print citation purposes only. While the final peer-reviewed paper may be licensed under a cc-by license on publication, at this stage authors and publisher expressively prohibit redistribution of this draft paper other than for review purposes.