Public Health and Online Misinformation: Challenges and Recommendations.

By B. Swire‐Thompson, David M. J. Lazer. Annual Review of Public Health, 2019

907 citations recorded by the source corpus.

The internet has become a popular resource to learn about health and to investigate one's own health condition. However, given the large amount of inaccurate information online, people can easily become misinformed. Individuals have always obtained information from outside the formal health care system, so how has the internet changed people's engagement with health information? This review explores how individuals interact with health misinformation online, whether it be through search, user-generated content, or mobile apps. We discuss whether personal access to information is helping or hindering health outcomes and how the perceived trustworthiness of the institutions communicating health has changed over time. To conclude, we propose several constructive strategies for improving the online information ecosystem. Misinformation concerning health has particularly severe consequences with regard to people's quality of life and even their risk of mortality; therefore, understanding it within today's modern context is an extremely important task. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Public Health, Volume 41 is April 1, 2020. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.

Subfields: General Health Professions, Health, Sociology and Political Science

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/5ce7e5a6a5cc5a177b4b823780a9f5c5a9776fec

How researchers see this paper

The researchers whose trusted networks rank it highest, strongest advocate first. Every researcher gets a different order.

In General Health Professions

1. J. Lloyd
2. Don Nutbeam
3. I. Kickbusch
4. Arindam Basu
5. David Brinson

In Health

1. J. Lloyd
2. Don Nutbeam

In Sociology and Political Science

1. Dominique Brossard
2. Dietram A. Scheufele
3. Nicole M. Krause
4. Isabelle Freiling
5. Andrew F. Hayes
6. Shirley S. Ho
7. Kristopher J Preacher
8. Douglas M. McLeod

Citations in the corpus

• Understanding and Responding to Health Literacy as a Social Determinant of Health. (2020, background): “A review of online health information and misinformation by Swire-Thompson & Lazer in 2020 recognized that the quality of online information is problematic (66).”
• Believing and sharing misinformation, fact-checks, and accurate information on social media: The role of anxiety during COVID-19 (2021, background): ““[M] isinformation concerning health has particularly severe consequences with regard to people’s quality of life and even their risk of mortality” (Swire-Thompson and Lazer, 2020: 434)—indeed, there are already cases of unsubstantiated claims about COVID-19 leading to death (Shepherd, 2020).”