The Story My Friend Told Me: Examining the Interplay of Message Format and Relational Closeness in Misinformation Correction

ABSTRACT

Narrative messages have been considered a potentially useful tool for correcting misinformation. However, prior research has found that the effect of narrative condition is often moderated by other communication characteristics. On social media, the relational closeness to an information endorser may serve as a heuristic cue to the endorser’s trustworthiness, ultimately influencing the acceptance of the endorsed information. In the current study, a 2 (message format: narrative vs. non-narrative) × 2 (relational closeness: distant vs. close friend) between-subjects online experiment tested the effects of narrative communication in correcting misinformation related to nicotine replacement therapy, conditioned by relational closeness to the person endorsing the correction on social media. The effects of the correction messages and relational closeness to the endorsers were assessed in an immediate test (T1) and a one-week delayed test (T2). When the correction was imagined to be endorsed by a close friend, narrative correction was more effective in increasing perceived trustworthiness of the correction endorser, leading to more favorable persuasion outcomes including T1 beliefs, T1 attitude, T2 beliefs, and T2 attitude. The indirect effect was not significant if participants imagined the correction was endorsed by a distant friend.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/15213269.2024.2383196