Pandemic Politics: Predictors of Misinformed COVID-19 Beliefs in Brazil (Pre-Recorded)

• In Event: Disinformation Across Platforms and Contexts

Abstract

The spread of misinformation on social media has been the focus of scholarly attention in the past few years, primarily motivated by political events such as the Brexit referendum in the UK, the presidential elections in the US, Brazil, and India in 2016, 2018, and 2019 respectively. Amidst concerns around both the amount of false or misleading information social media users are exposed to (Chadwick et al., 2018; Rossini et al., 2020), the challenges in correcting misinformed beliefs (Bode & Vraga, 2018; Nyhan & Reifler, 2010), and the role of politically motivated disinformation campaigns (Wooley & Howard, 2018), the Covid-19 pandemic has contributed to shifting the focus from political to health misinformation. Since the early stages of the pandemic, governments, and public officials have been challenged by the rapid spread of false, inaccurate, or completely made up claims about the virus circulating on social media and private messaging applications such as WhatsApp.
The concern with the volume of false information and the difficulty in providing the public with reliable and accurate information is not unwarranted, as a majority of the population in several countries demonstrate growing concerns with distinguishing false information online (Newman et al., 2020). With lockdown measures, working-from-home regimes, and other restrictions, people are online at unprecedented rates, increasing the likelihood of being exposed to false or misleading information about Covid-19.
Given the dangers of an ill-informed populace amidst a global health crisis, social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter have been proactive in moderating false and misinforming claims about Covid-19. However, in countries such as Brazil, people are increasingly using private messaging applications such as WhatsApp to get information and to talk about the news, raising concerns about the quality and the reliability of the information that circulates on the platform. Prior research suggests that WhatsApp users believe they are frequently exposed to false, misleading, or exaggerated information (Rossini et al, 2020).
While a key challenge of the pandemic is to keep the public informed amidst a developing and ever-changing situation—made more difficult, for instance, if the public starts to avoid information about the crisis (Hameleers et al., 2020)—the high level of political polarization in several countries has turned the response to the pandemic into a political dispute in countries such as the US and Brazil, with government and opposition constantly clashing over actions and policies to address the pandemic. In this context, false and misleading information also comes from the top: Donald Trump and Jair Bolsonaro are known for downplaying the risks of the virus and promoting treatments that have no scientific support. Emerging research suggests that the politicization of the pandemic has detrimental effects on the public. In the US, scholars found that Republicans and those who approve of former president Trump are more likely to believe in conspiracies about the virus and to be less compliant with public health guidelines (Enders et al., 2020; Jamieson & Albarracin, 2020; Uscinski et al., 2020).
Drawing from a two-wave online panel survey (N = 1,378) with a representative sample of the Brazilian population, this paper investigates the correlates of holding misinformed beliefs about Covid-19, focusing on the consumption of partisan information sources, news, and social media. Considering the high polarization around the pandemic in Brazil, we also investigate the extent to which political ideology, support for the president, and institutional trust affect the acquisition of factual knowledge about Covid-19.
We find that a) discussion about Covid-19 with weak ties on WhatsApp is correlated with belief in more misinformed statements about Covid-19 and lower factual knowledge about Covid-19 overtime, b) the presidential approval is strongly correlated with belief in more misinformed statements about Covid-19 and lower factual knowledge about Covid-19 over time and c) exposure to alternative partisan news is associated with belief in more misinformed statements about Covid-19 over time. Traditional news use was not significantly associated with belief in misinformed statements over time while it was marginally significantly correlated with increases in factual knowledge about Covid-19.
Our findings highlight the mechanisms and the complex ways under which the diffusion of information through digital technologies can affect exposure to and belief in misinformation. While exposure to news about Covid-19 in social networks or WhatsApp groups with strong ties were not particularly influential in driving belief in misinformed statements, it was information reached through large WhatsApp groups and alternative digital-born outlets that particularly drove belief misinformation and lower levels of knowledge about Covid-19.

Authors

• Patricia Rossini, University of Liverpool

• Antonis Kalogeropoulos, University of Oxford