Meeting People Where They Are: Hyper‐local Engagements Around COVID‐19 Misinformation in New Jersey

Abstract

This paper details the findings from a study investigating the efficacy of community‐based and ‐organized information sessions for dispelling public health misinformation around COVID‐19. The authors used community‐engaged participatory action research methods to co‐organize town halls with community members, groups, and officials to disseminate COVID information for two New Jersey towns and townships with differing demographic compositions in late 2020 through 2021. These sessions aimed to share reliable, trustworthy public health and safety information around the COVID‐19 pandemic. This small‐scale, qualitative study suggests that this type of hyper‐localized information session where residents can interact with local leaders and talk openly about local problems around public health can be a point of connection for people with their community, that helps them access and address localized public health problems in myriad ways. In so doing, this study suggests ways to re‐imagine public health information and communication practices to promote informational justice.