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      Dynamics of Feedback Behaviours to Social Peers Sharing COVID-19 Misinformation on WhatsApp in Brazil

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          Abstract

          Objective

          Online COVID-19 misinformation is a serious concern in Brazil, home to the second largest WhatsApp user base and the second highest number of COVID-19 deaths. We examined the extent to which WhatsApp users might be willing to correct their peers who might share COVID-19 misinformation.

          Materials and Methods

          We conducted a cross-sectional online survey using Qualtrics among N = 726 Brazilian adults to identify the types of social correction behaviours (SCBs) and health and technological factors that shape the performance of these behaviours.

          Results

          Brazil’s WhatsApp users expressed medium to high levels of willingness to engage in SCBs. We discovered three modes of SCBs: correction to the group, correction to the sender only, and passive or no correction . WhatsApp users with lower levels of educational attainment and from younger age groups were less inclined to provide corrections. Lastly, perceived severity of COVID-19 and the ability to critically evaluate a message were positively associated with providing corrections to either the group or the sender.

          Discussion

          The demographic analyses point to the need to strengthen information literacy among population groups that are younger with lower levels of educational attainment. These efforts could facilitate individual-level contributions to the global fight against misinformation by the World Health Organisation in collaboration with member states, social media companies and civil society.

          Conclusion

          Our study suggests that Brazil’s WhatsApp users might be willing to actively respond with feedback when exposed to COVID-19 misinformation by their peers on small world networks like WhatsApp groups.

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          Author and article information

          Journal
          J Am Med Inform Assoc
          J Am Med Inform Assoc
          jamia
          Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association : JAMIA
          Oxford University Press
          1067-5027
          1527-974X
          21 October 2021
          21 October 2021
          : ocab219
          Affiliations
          [1 ]NB 138, Northumbria University , Newcastle upon Tyne NE1 8ST, Telephone, United Kingdom
          [2 ]COCO Lab, Northumbria University , Newcastle upon Tyne NE1 8ST, United Kingdom
          [3 ]Journalism Building, Room 223-F, University of Georgia Grady , 120 Hooper Street, Athens, 30602-3018, Georgia, USA
          [4 ]Avenida L3 Norte, s/n, Campus Universitário Darcy Ribeiro , Gleba A, CEP, 70.904, BRAZIL, : -130—Brasilia—DF
          Author notes
          Corresponding Email: santosh.vijaykumar@ 123456northumbria.ac.uk , : (+44) 7393570480
          Article
          ocab219
          10.1093/jamia/ocab219
          8586730
          34672323
          677cc281-f133-4593-877e-a415760bcc2d
          © The Author(s) 2021. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Medical Informatics Association.

          This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License ( https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted reuse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

          History
          : 20 April 2021
          : 15 October 2021
          : 21 September 2021
          Page count
          Pages: 28
          Categories
          Research and Applications
          AcademicSubjects/MED00580
          AcademicSubjects/SCI01060
          AcademicSubjects/SCI01530
          Custom metadata
          accepted-manuscript
          PAP

          Bioinformatics & Computational biology
          misinformation,covid-19,social media,correction,behavior,brazil
          Bioinformatics & Computational biology
          misinformation, covid-19, social media, correction, behavior, brazil

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