Fake news self-efficacy, fake news identification, and content sharing on Facebook

ABSTRACT

This study explored the concept of self-efficacy in the context of fake news identification and sharing on Facebook. The results indicated that those scoring high on a measure of Facebook-based fake news self-efficacy (i.e., confidence in one’s ability to identify factually incorrect current events information on Facebook) performed increasingly well on a fake news identification and classification task. For its part, the ability to identify and properly classify fake news was shown to be negatively related to the self-reported likelihood of sharing of fake news on Facebook.

KEYWORDS:

• Fake news
• Facebook
• social media
• self-efficacy

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Additional information

Notes on contributors

Toby Hopp

Toby Hopp’s published academic work focuses on issues such as online mis-and-disinformation, political incivility on social media, political knowledge, and organizational transparency.