Closed-group message provenance plus social pressure drives viral misinformation sharing

Evidence

What this signals to me, is that people automatically imbue the messages they receive with some degree of credibility because they come from a closed private group, even though its content may appear to be fake news. But it’s not only about credibility; there’s also social pressure to comply with forwarding requests, which we know can interfere with our motivations to be accurate. For example, in India, WhatsApp messages about the kidnappings would often be accompanied by explicit social pleas such as: ‘Share this video in all your WhatsApp groups. Anyone who does not, is not his mother’s son.’ — Sander van der Linden, Foolproof, 353

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the Milgrom law-merchant work on reputation and group-based trust sustaining cooperation through social pressure. — connects to: Groups exploit community suspicion to promote vaccine rejection — Anna Merlan, Republic of Lies, 173; Social validation through sharing now substitutes for evidence as credibility — Russell Muirhead and Nancy L. Rosenblum, A Lot of People Are Saying: The New…, 15; Urgency, group pressure, and inattention predict fake-news sharing — Sander van der Linden, Foolproof: Why Misinformation Infects…, 325 (+3 more)

Broader Connections

• Urgent threatening messages, group pressure, and shallow assessment drive fake-news sharing. #corroborates (0.85) — Sander van der Linden, Foolproof, 325
• Urgency, group pressure, and inattention predict fake-news sharing #expands (0.82) — Sander van der Linden, Foolproof, 325
• Explicit social coercion embedded in messages overrides accuracy motivations. #corroborates (0.80) — Sander van der Linden, Foolproof, 353
• Beliefs gain validity from social endorsement and shared beliefs create social connection #expands (0.75) — John F. Dovidio, Peter Glick, Laurie A. Rudman, On the Nature of Prejudice, 2367