Cultural Evolution and Digital Media: Diffusion of Fake News About COVID-19 on Twitter.

ABSTRACT: Disinformation (fake news) is a major problem that affects modern populations, especially in an era when information can be spread from one corner of the world to another in just one click. The diffusion of misinformation becomes more problematic when it addresses issues related to health, as it can affect people at both the individual and population levels. Through the ideas proposed by cultural evolution theory, in this study, we seek to understand the dynamics of disseminating messages (cultural traits) with untrue content (maladaptive traits). For our investigation, we used the scenario caused by the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic as a model. The instability caused by the pandemic provides a good model for the study of adapted and maladaptive traits, as the information ca

SUBMITTER: de Oliveira DVB 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8397611 | biostudies-literature | 2021

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature