There’s a thoughtful session at Facebook research labs, that stems from a significant question – “What if the complete chain of posts related to misinformation were removed entirely, what impact would that have on Facebook’s interaction and engagement?”
This topic for Facebook research comes after the infamous Facebook Files Leak, which proves that a large chunk of misinformation is spread via post re-shares.
“The report noted that people are four times more likely to see misinformation when they encounter a post via a share of a share – kind of like a retweet of a retweet – compared to a typical photo or link on Facebook. Add a few more shares to the chain, and people are five to ten times more likely to see misinformation. It gets worse in certain countries. In India, people who encounter “deep reshares,” as the researchers call them, are twenty times more likely to see misinformation.”
Facebook research states that re-shares are more dangerous than posts in spreading misinformation.
& there’s more –
“The study found that 38% of all [views] of link posts with misinformation take place after two reshares. For photos, the numbers increase – 65% of views of photo misinformation take place after two reshares. Facebook Pages, meanwhile, don’t rely on deep reshares for distribution. About 20% of page content is viewed at a reshare depth of two or higher.”
This Facebook research is not only in regards to Facebook only – it takes into account the facebook owned instant messaging platform, WhatsApp, as well, however, there is a way to curb that –
“Since putting into place the new limit, globally, there has been a 70% reduction in the number of highly forwarded messages sent on WhatsApp. This change is helping keep WhatsApp a place for personal and private conversations.”
Facebook did actually take some measures back in 2018 to stop spread of misinformation. See screenshot below –
As you can see above, in 20218, Facebook removed the re-share button and replaced it with send message button. It. seemed promising at that time, but facebook research shows that maybe people have get used to it, as the re-shares have increased over time.
Facebook CEO, Mark Zuckerberg does not endorse, nor refute this claim of Facebook research, but takes it up wisely –
“If we wanted to ignore research, why would we create an industry-leading research program to understand these important issues in the first place? If we didn’t care about fighting harmful content, then why would we employ so many more people dedicated to this than any other company in our space – even ones larger than us? If we wanted to hide our results, why would we have established an industry-leading standard for transparency and reporting on what we’re doing?”
What do you think about this facebook research results? Let’s connect in comments.
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