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Online sources not only permeate the information-seeking environment of the younger generation, but also have profound influence in shaping their beliefs and behaviors. In this landscape, examining the factors responsible for credibility perceptions of online information is fundamental, particularly for health-related information. Using a 2 (frames: gain vs. loss) × 2 (source: expert vs. non-expert) × 2 (social endorsement: high vs. low) randomized between-subjects experimental design, this study examines the effect of health message framing and the moderating effects of social endorsement and source type on credibility perceptions of Facebook posts. Testing across two issues--physical activity and alcohol consumption--findings indicate that the gain-framed message was perceived as most credible. Additionally, significant three-way interactions suggest that social endorsement and source type affect the relationship between message framing and credibility perceptions. Specifically, the findings demonstrate that a gain-framed message from an expert source with high number of 'likes' is considered the most credible message. These findings have significant implications for information gathering from social media sources, such as the influence of 'likes' on health information.

Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, misinformation has been circulating on social media and multiple conspiracy theories have since become quite popular. We conducted a U.S. national survey for three main purposes. First, we aim to examine the association between social media news consumption and conspiracy beliefs specific to COVID-19 and general conspiracy beliefs. Second, we investigate the influence of an important moderator, social media news trust, that has been overlooked in prior studies. Third, we further propose a moderated moderation model by including misinformation identification. Our findings show that social media news use was associated with higher conspiracy beliefs, and trust in social media news was found to be a significant moderator of the relationship between social media news use and conspiracy beliefs. Moreover, our findings show that misinformation identification moderated the relationship between social media news use and trust. Implications are discussed.

With the emergence of new media technologies, being new media literate and able to critically analyze new media information are important to young adults, a group of individuals that are particularly active on social media. However, since the development of new media literacy, no study to date examined demographic characteristics, personality factors, and social network site (SNS) use related to it. More importantly, no research examined the relationship between new media literacy and perceptions and actions related to controversial issues. These under-explored facets deter practitioners from tailoring future new media literacy curricula and identifying the targeted audience. With a survey of 551 young adults, our study revealed that media literacy practitioners should devote more attention to (a) Caucasian males with low SNS use, (b) non-Caucasian females with low SNS use, and (c) individuals with low Need for Cognition and SNS use. Our study further showed that increasing new media literacy can help reduce misperceptions induced by misinformation that is rampant in the new media environment.

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