Finding an antidote: Testing the use of proactive crisis strategies to protect organizations from astroturf attacks

Debunking misinformation in times of crisis: Exploring misinformation correction strategies for effective internal crisis communication

“…Since misinformation is widespread in a crisis, crisis communication managers face the challenge of preventing negative outcomes caused by crisis misinformation, which undermines the effectiveness of evidence‐based communication efforts (Boman & Schneider, 2021; Ohme et al, 2021). Specifically, researchers have found that crisis misinformation not only damages organizational reputation, public‐organization relationships and organizational financial performance, but also is very difficult to correct and/or often continues to influence publics' beliefs (e.g., crisis misperception) and subsequently leads to detrimental behaviours (e.g., discouraging preventive behaviours) (Barua et al, 2020; Lewandowsky et al, 2012; Nyhan & Reilfler, 2015).…”

“…Mehta et al (2021) suggested that the removal of crisis misinformation should be reflected in positive evaluations of an organization's reputation. Boman and Schneider (2021) maintained that a proactive crisis response was needed to avoid detrimental effects on the organizational reputation caused by not responding to the crisis misinformation. In terms of misinformation correction strategy, Jin et al (2020) found that factual elaboration to correct misinformation was likely to generate a better organizational reputation.…”

“…Johar et al (2010) also maintained that a company under attack of a false accusation must defend itself with a rebuttal strategy against the spurious allegation. Regarding the prebunking strategy, researchers have pointed out that ‘practitioners cannot always predict the exact details of a crisis to forewarn stakeholders’ as forewarnings need specific explanation rather than mere general mention (Boman & Schneider, 2021; p. 3; Lewandowsky et al, 2012; p. 116).…”

“…In the same vein, researchers have also suggested that a positive postcrisis reputation is a key outcome of debunking crisis misinformation, because organizational reputation—an intangible asset to organizations—should be strategically protected against crisis misinformation (Boman & Schneider, 2021; Mehta et al, 2021). Coombs (2014) recommended denial messages to fight crisis misinformation (debunking misinformation) as an effective strategy to reduce reputational damage in a crisis.…”

“…Accordingly, previous research has focused on communication strategies for debunking misinformation to help crisis communicators understand how to prevent negative outcomes that undermine the effectiveness of evidence‐based communication efforts (Boman & Schneider, 2021; Tan et al, 2015). Such research has suggested adopting a twofold information correction (debunking) strategy: simple rebuttal (e.g., brief correction information) and factual elaboration (e.g., a detailed debunking message with more elaborated narratives) (Lewandowsky et al, 2012).…”