Does exposure necessarily lead to misbelief? A meta-analysis of susceptibility to health misinformation

Abstract

A meta-analysis was conducted to quantify the overall effect of health misinformation exposure on shaping misbelief. Aggregation of results from 28 individual randomized controlled trial studies ( n = 8752) reveals a positive but small average effect, d = 0.28. Moderation analyses suggest that adults who are younger and female tend to develop higher misbelief if exposed to health misinformation. Furthermore, media platform, message falsity, and misbelief measurements also contribute to the exposure effect. These findings offer nuanced but crucial insights into existing misinformation literature, and development of more effective strategies to mitigate the adverse impacts of health misinformation.