Cargando…

COVID-19 Information Sources and Misinformation by Faith Community

Faith communities support a variety of public health initiatives as conduits of information and service distribution points. However, with the onset of the coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19), there is concern that religious communities may be echo chambers for misinformation and conspiracy theories tha...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Lee Rogers, Richard, Powe, Nicolette
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: SAGE Publications 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9152626/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35634989
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/00469580221081388
_version_ 1784717689024937984
author Lee Rogers, Richard
Powe, Nicolette
author_facet Lee Rogers, Richard
Powe, Nicolette
author_sort Lee Rogers, Richard
collection PubMed
description Faith communities support a variety of public health initiatives as conduits of information and service distribution points. However, with the onset of the coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19), there is concern that religious communities may be echo chambers for misinformation and conspiracy theories that are undercutting the adoption of precautions to prevent transmission and the use of COVID-19 vaccines. The purpose of this study is to identify the receptivity to and spread of misinformation about COVID-19 by faith communities and whether embracing these inaccuracies constitutes a uniquely religious effect. This study conducted three small analyses approach. First, we engaged in the automated text mining of approximately 2.3 million discussion posts from discussion forums noted for their conspiracism and extremism. Next,  secondary quantitative analysis of two recent surveys from the American Trends Panels by Pew Research conducted in April 2020 (N = 9482) and February 2021 (N = 9429) were conducted to determine whether sources of information and preventive behaviors related to the pandemic were associated with uniquely religious effects or possibly mediated by other factors such as sociodemographic characteristics or political views. The association of White evangelicals with politicized misinformation was consistent across all three small studies. Prior to the availability of vaccines, religious themes consistently appeared in 15–19% of COVID-19 social media posts and were higher in subsets of the discourse tied to misinformation. The framing of COVID-19 using religious language was associated with the Christian right in about half of the religiously-themed posts. Religious themes fell below the 15% threshold once the vaccine was available. In the survey research, small, uniquely religious effects were found with White evangelical receptivity of COVID-19 information from Donald Trump and less reliance on information from public health experts, and small, uniquely religious associations were found with preventive measures. Among White nonevangelical Protestants and non-Hispanic Roman Catholics, there was found the same combination of a higher likelihood of reliance on messages from the Donald Trump Presidency and a lower likelihood for news-media use. Black Protestants showed a higher level of use and trust in state and local government officials. The study confirmed higher use of social media among non-Hispanic Roman Catholics but did not find this relationship among Hispanic Protestants. Faith communities are not always receptive to public health messages that promote the public good. This study indicates that the religion effects can appear early, giving time for health education specialists to address them, and that these effects can diminish once preventive measures are available.
format Online
Article
Text
id pubmed-9152626
institution National Center for Biotechnology Information
language English
publishDate 2022
publisher SAGE Publications
record_format MEDLINE/PubMed
spelling pubmed-91526262022-05-31 COVID-19 Information Sources and Misinformation by Faith Community Lee Rogers, Richard Powe, Nicolette Inquiry Original Research Article Faith communities support a variety of public health initiatives as conduits of information and service distribution points. However, with the onset of the coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19), there is concern that religious communities may be echo chambers for misinformation and conspiracy theories that are undercutting the adoption of precautions to prevent transmission and the use of COVID-19 vaccines. The purpose of this study is to identify the receptivity to and spread of misinformation about COVID-19 by faith communities and whether embracing these inaccuracies constitutes a uniquely religious effect. This study conducted three small analyses approach. First, we engaged in the automated text mining of approximately 2.3 million discussion posts from discussion forums noted for their conspiracism and extremism. Next,  secondary quantitative analysis of two recent surveys from the American Trends Panels by Pew Research conducted in April 2020 (N = 9482) and February 2021 (N = 9429) were conducted to determine whether sources of information and preventive behaviors related to the pandemic were associated with uniquely religious effects or possibly mediated by other factors such as sociodemographic characteristics or political views. The association of White evangelicals with politicized misinformation was consistent across all three small studies. Prior to the availability of vaccines, religious themes consistently appeared in 15–19% of COVID-19 social media posts and were higher in subsets of the discourse tied to misinformation. The framing of COVID-19 using religious language was associated with the Christian right in about half of the religiously-themed posts. Religious themes fell below the 15% threshold once the vaccine was available. In the survey research, small, uniquely religious effects were found with White evangelical receptivity of COVID-19 information from Donald Trump and less reliance on information from public health experts, and small, uniquely religious associations were found with preventive measures. Among White nonevangelical Protestants and non-Hispanic Roman Catholics, there was found the same combination of a higher likelihood of reliance on messages from the Donald Trump Presidency and a lower likelihood for news-media use. Black Protestants showed a higher level of use and trust in state and local government officials. The study confirmed higher use of social media among non-Hispanic Roman Catholics but did not find this relationship among Hispanic Protestants. Faith communities are not always receptive to public health messages that promote the public good. This study indicates that the religion effects can appear early, giving time for health education specialists to address them, and that these effects can diminish once preventive measures are available. SAGE Publications 2022-05-30 /pmc/articles/PMC9152626/ /pubmed/35634989 http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/00469580221081388 Text en © The Author(s) 2022 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits non-commercial use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access pages (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage).
spellingShingle Original Research Article
Lee Rogers, Richard
Powe, Nicolette
COVID-19 Information Sources and Misinformation by Faith Community
title COVID-19 Information Sources and Misinformation by Faith Community
title_full COVID-19 Information Sources and Misinformation by Faith Community
title_fullStr COVID-19 Information Sources and Misinformation by Faith Community
title_full_unstemmed COVID-19 Information Sources and Misinformation by Faith Community
title_short COVID-19 Information Sources and Misinformation by Faith Community
title_sort covid-19 information sources and misinformation by faith community
topic Original Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9152626/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35634989
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/00469580221081388
work_keys_str_mv AT leerogersrichard covid19informationsourcesandmisinformationbyfaithcommunity
AT powenicolette covid19informationsourcesandmisinformationbyfaithcommunity