Health-Related Rumor Control through Social Collaboration Models: Lessons from Cases in China during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Widely spread health-related rumors may mislead the public, escalate social panic, compromise government credibility, and threaten public health. Social collaboration models that maximize the functions and advantages of various agents of socialization can be a promising way to control health-related rumors. Existing research on health-related rumors, however, is limited in studying how various agents collaborate with each other to debunk rumors. This study utilizes content analysis to code the text data of health-related rumor cases in China during the COVID-19 pandemic. The study found that socialized rumor-debunking models could be divided into the following five categories: the government-led model, the media-led model, the scientific community-led model, the rumor-debunking platform-led model, and the multi-agent collaborative model. In addition, since rumors in public health crises often involve different objects, rumor refutation requires various information sources; therefore, different rumor-debunking models apply. This study verifies the value of socialized collaborative rumor debunking, advocates and encourages the participation of multiple agents of socialization and provides guidance for establishing a collaborative rumor-debunking model, thereby promoting efficient rumor-debunking methods and improving the healthcare of society.