A new digital literacy framework to mitigate misinformation in social media infodemic
Global Knowledge, Memory and Communication
ISSN: 2514-9342
Article publication date: 14 November 2022
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to examine how digital literacy competency can mitigate misinformation in social media among young adults. In recent years, concerns over misinformation have triggered a renewed interest in the aspect of digital literacy. Many young adults in Malaysia are not able to differentiate between real news and fake news. Although there are plenty of studies examining fake news, studies examining the mitigation of misinformation through the lens of digital literacy are still rudimentary.
Design/methodology/approach
This research adopted a quantitative approach by conducting a cross-sectional survey among university students in Malaysia to examine how their digital literacy competency influences misinformation. The sample size was estimated GPower software. A total of 134 respondents between the age of 19 and 25 were sampled because young adults in this age group tend to show little difference in their digital literacy level. Structural equation modelling (SEM) was used to examine the proposed model.
Findings
The study results reveal that two of the three domains of digital literacy competence, technical literacy and cognitive literacy, have a positive association in reducing misinformation among university students; however, socio-emotional literacy has the opposite effect. Additionally, the survey also explicates that hedonic motivation helps in misinformation mitigation, whereas habit does not.
Originality/value
Theoretically, this study contributes to the literature by revealing how digital literacy can help in identifying misinformation masquerading as valid information through proper verification and analysis, especially in the digital age where everyone is susceptible to misinformation. The results of the study also contribute to the development of a new digital literacy framework that can cultivate a digitally literate generation who can navigate the informational landscape smartly and therefore distinguish between facts and fake news.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
This work was supported and funded by Multimedia University, Malaysia, under the Internal Research Funding (MMUI/210115).
Credit authorship contribution statement: Lilian Anthonysamy: Conceptualization, Formal analysis, Methodology, Literature Review, Writing-original draft.
Pravina Sivakumar: Conceptualization, Data curation, Project administration, Data Collection, writing-review and editing.
Declaration of competing interest: The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
Ethical declaration: This research is the authors’ own original work, which has not been previously published elsewhere. The paper is not currently being considered for publication elsewhere. The paper reflects the authors’ own research and analysis in a truthful and complete manner. Approval was obtained from the local ethics committee. The paper properly credits the meaningful contributions of co-authors and co-researchers. The results are appropriately placed in the context of prior and existing research. All sources used are properly disclosed (correct citation). Literally copying of text must be indicated as such by using quotation marks and giving proper reference. All authors have been personally and actively involved in substantial work leading to the paper and will take public responsibility for its content.
Citation
Anthonysamy, L. and Sivakumar, P. (2022), "A new digital literacy framework to mitigate misinformation in social media infodemic", Global Knowledge, Memory and Communication, Vol. ahead-of-print No. ahead-of-print. https://doi.org/10.1108/GKMC-06-2022-0142
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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