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Social media users who report content are key allies in managing online misinformation; however, no research has yet been conducted to understand the trends underlying their activity. We suggest an original approach to studying misinformation: examining it from the reporting users’ perspective both at the content level and comparatively across regi...
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... start by examining the distributions of S1's items for each class and country, illustrated in Figure 2. The dark blue bars represent the normalized distribution of reported content per class, which appears to be mostly concentrated around the I (irrelevant content), MS (scams, spams, fake offers or announcements), O1 (opinions) and C2 (controversial content) classes on both platforms across the three countries. Examples of such content are represented in Figure 3. The light blue bars represent the deviation of the number of reports between the two platforms as a measure of the homogeneity of content reported on the two platforms in the same country. ...
Citations
... A study comparing "reported content on Instagram and Facebook" in France, the UK, and the US revealed significant regional differences in the type, topic, and manipulation techniques of misinformation. For instance, users in the US encountered more sophisticated methods of manipulation, revealing how perception and engagement with misinformation are influenced by the cultural context [57]. In another study, Greek respondents showed significant mistrust in the reliability of war-related information on social media. ...
As our society increasingly relies on digital platforms for information, the spread of fake news has become a pressing concern. This study investigates the ability of Greek and Portuguese Instagram users to identify fake news, highlighting the influence of cultural differences. The responses of 220 Instagram users were collected through questionnaires in Greece and Portugal. The data analysis investigates characteristics of Instagram posts, social endorsement, and platform usage duration. The results reveal distinct user behaviors: Greeks exhibit a unique inclination towards social connections, displaying an increased trust in friends’ content and investing more time on Instagram, reflecting the importance of personal connections in their media consumption. They also give less importance to a certain post’s characteristics, such as content opposing personal beliefs, emotional language, and poor grammar, spelling, or formatting when identifying fake news, compared to the Portuguese, suggesting a weaker emphasis on content quality in their evaluations. These findings show that cultural differences affect how people behave on Instagram. Hence, content creators, platforms, and policymakers need specific plans to make online spaces more informative. Strategies should focus on enhancing awareness of key indicators of fake news, such as linguistic quality and post structure, while addressing the role of personal and social networks in the spread of misinformation.
... For example, some social media platforms alert users when they encounter unverified information and enhance related algorithm mechanisms Vraga, 2015, 2018;Meixler, 2017). Authorities encourage users to report or flag misinformation to social media companies (Etienne and Çelebi, 2023;Gimpel et al., 2021;Pennycook and Rand, 2019a). ...
The rapid expansion of the Internet and social media has intensified the spread of health misinformation, posing significant risks, especially for older adults. This meta-analysis synthesizes evidence on the prevalence and interventions of health misinformation among older adults. Our findings reveal a high prevalence rate of 47% (95% CI [33%, 60%]), surpassing recent estimates. Offline research settings have a higher prevalence of health misinformation. Despite methodological variances, the prevalence remains consistent across different measures and development levels. Interventions show significant effectiveness (Hedges’ g = 0.76, 95% CI [0.25, 1.26]), with graphic-based approaches outperforming video-based ones. These results underscore the urgent need for tailored, large-scale interventions to mitigate the adverse impacts of health misinformation on older adults. Further research should focus on refining intervention strategies and extending studies to underrepresented regions and populations.
... The reporting feature was designed for Instagram users to report policy violations to the platform's administrators and thus trigger moderation actions. However, Etienne and Çelebi (2023) identified that users report accounts for other reasons, including expressing negative feelings about a user and inconveniencing the user, which is consistent with other research (Grossman et al., 2020;Smyrnaios & Papaevangelou, 2020). Considering that neither Travis Scott nor DaBaby's accounts broke Instagram's policies during the considered period, the exceptionally numerous reports logged against the two rappers likely belong to this category and can be interpreted as an attempt to sanction them for their offline behaviour. ...
We combine philosophical theories with quantitative analyses of online data to propose a sophisticated approach to social media influencers. Identifying influencers as communication systems emerging from a dialectic interactional process between content creators and in-development audiences, we define them mainly using the composition of their audience and the type of publications they use to communicate. To examine these two parameters, we analyse the audiences of 619 Instagram accounts of French, English, and American influencers and 2,400 of their publications in light of Girard’s mimetic theory and McLuhan’s media theory. We observe meaningful differences in influencers’ profiles, typical audiences, and content type across influencers’ classes, supporting the claim that such communication systems are articulated around ‘reading contracts’ upon which influencers’ image is based and from which their influence derives. While the upkeep of their influence relies on them sticking to this contract, we observe that successful influencers shift their content type when growing their audiences and explain the strategies they implement to address this double bind. Different types of contract breaches then lead to distinct outcomes, which we identify by analysing various types of followers’ feedback. In mediating social interactions, digital platforms reshape society in various ways; this interdisciplinary study helps understand how the digitalisation of social influencers affects reciprocity and mimetic behaviours.
