Technique-Based Inoculations
What Works to Build Mental Immunity - #6
Technique-based inoculations empower students to identify persuasion strategies that are commonly used to mislead. Learning about emotional manipulation, for example, can confer a degree of immunity to it. Learning to recognize logical fallacies (the focus of this post) can make you less susceptible to being fooled by them. Extensive research in psychological inoculation underscores the effectiveness of this approach.1 (See also Prebunking.)
Applications
Teach students to recognize common techniques used in misinformation.2 Start with humorous or non-triggering examples, then use real-world examples to illustrate how these techniques can distort truth.
Have students create their own misinformation using known misleading techniques. This active inoculation3 process reinforces their ability to recognize and resist such techniques in real situations.
Have a classroom discussion in which students identify the techniques used by their classmates. Encourage students to name the techniques and explain why they can be effective at misleading people.
Notes
Two experiments with hundreds of participants4 demonstrate the power of technique-based inoculation. Participants who were informed about misleading techniques before being presented with misinformation were less likely to adopt the misinformation than participants who were not informed of the misleading techniques. The techniques used and inoculated against were false balance and fake experts.5
Learn More
The “Bad News” game teaches us to recognize deceptive techniques in a fun way.6
This post is part of our “What Works” series for educators and researchers.
We are open to incorporating feedback into these modules before we publish them on our website. Please comment on this post to provide suggestions. We’re particularly interested in additional applications, resources, and readings. All constructive feedback is welcomed. Thank you!
In other news...
We’ve Launched our What Works Website Page!
We’ve launched our What Works to Build Mental Immunity Website page!
Access all the What Works modules in one place, see what’s to come, and download module PDFs!
Mental Immunity Project Director on NPR
Our Director Andy Norman was recently interview on KPCW, an NPR radio show. Listen to the 24-minute episode here.7
Foolproof: Why Misinformation Infects Our Minds and How to Build Immunity, by Sander van der Linden. http://www.foolproofbook.com
Cook J, Lewandowsky S, Ecker UKH (2017) Neutralizing misinformation through inoculation: Exposing misleading argumentation techniques reduces their influence. PLOS ONE 12(5): e0175799. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0175799
Ibid 4, false balance: “media coverage that evenly balances contrarian voices and expert views”; fake experts, example: “political operatives and lobbyists who dissent from the consensus in public discourse.”
What happened to Critical Thinking ?