Wes Regan

Yeah, it's a great question.

And I think as we have begun to see the effect of misinformation, disinformation, conspiracy theories on public discourse and on democracy, a lot of research is starting to turn more and more attention to this.

And I think there's some really good research coming out of the U.S.,

Kaylin O'Connor and James Weatherall, for example, had a great book that came out a number of years ago called The Misinformation Age, How False Beliefs Spread.

And they really turned attention to the social aspects of this.

So a lot of times, we tend to believe that people will believe misinformation or spread misinformation because of personal reasons.

But actually, what their work shows and what others have shown is that there are a lot of social factors in this.

It's peer networks, it's belonging, it's professional affiliations, it's political affiliations.

And with social media, we've seen audiences segment and go into little bubbles of affirmation where it feels good to be a part of a group of people who believe a certain belief.

way or have a certain worldview.

And so we're seeing epistemic polarization along with political polarization and people just really finding information that confirms their beliefs often and reaffirms that social connection.

Yeah.

So misinformation will be just factually incorrect or misleading information that is often shared, as you alluded to in the intro, often shared with good intentions.

So we might believe that bracelet is going to prevent COVID or this particular clothing item is going to increase your whatever metabolism or something by X amount, when in fact, there might not be any scientific validation of those claims.

And yet you want to help your

grandma or mom or friend or whoever it is.

And so, you know, or you yourself might want to believe that that's going to help because you're looking for something.

And so you might be inclined to share that thinking that this looks credible maybe, or has a whiff of credibility.

So let's go with it.

Whereas disinformation would be a little more nefarious and that's often spread by state actors or other powerful interests who are really looking to shape