How and why does false information spread online?

How does false information/”fake news” spread through social media and web sites? And, why does it?

We are told–frequently–by legitimate, trusted sources and the very people and organizations who create disinformation that a significant proportion of what we view is fake and has been deliberately created to sow discord and distrust, to make us not believe and to tear us apart.

So, do we trust no one? Is the biggest problem the sowing of doubt?

What does research tell us about the how and why of false information being spread online?

**updated May 2025**

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Sources:

*Broniatowski, D. A., Jamison, A. M., Qi, S., AlKulaib, L., Chen, T., Benton, A., . . . Dredze, M. (2018). Weaponized health communication: Twitter bots and Russian trolls amplify the vaccine debate. American Journal of Public Health, 108(10), 1378-1384.

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*Buchanan, T. (2020). Why do people spread false information online? the effects of message and viewer characteristics on self-reported likelihood of sharing social media disinformation. PLoS One, 15(10), e0239666.

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*Effron, D. A., & Medha, R. (2020). Misinformation and morality: Encountering fake-news headlines makes them seem less unethical to publish and share. Psychological Science, 31(1), 75-87.

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*Bennett, W. L., & Livingston, S. (2018). The disinformation order: Disruptive communication and the decline of democratic institutions. European Journal of Communication, 33(2), 122-139.

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*Greifeneder, R., Jaffe, M., Newman, E., & Schwarz, N. (2021). The psychology of fake news: Accepting, sharing, and correcting misinformation. Routledge.

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*Pennycook, G., & Rand, D. G. (2019). Fighting misinformation on social media using crowdsourced judgments of news source quality. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 116(7), 2521-2526.

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*Shao, C., Ciampaglia, G. L., Varol, O., Yang, K., Flammini, A., & Menczer, F. (2018). The spread of low-credibility content by social bots. Nature Communications, 9(1), 4787.

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Questions? Please let me know —

engelk@grinnell.edu