Disseminating scientific knowledge involves a high amount of responsibility on the shoulder of its authors. Therefore, it is extremely important to uphold the standards of ethical conduct while writing for a biomedical journal (Bithal 2016). According to the US department of Health and Human Services, scientific misconduct can be defined as plagiarism (presenting author’s ideas without attribution), fabrication (presenting unsubstantiated facts or data) or falsification (changing or selecting certain data to achieve a desired result, misrepresenting evidence, facts, or authorship. In particular, the latter is particularly entangled with the proliferation of scientific culture through the media. Fake news in today’s digital world commands headlines globally. Furthermore, misleading information is shared on social networks and spread across all sorts of social media. Being able to distinguish credible information from alternative facts is fundamental to curbing the dissemination and amplification of such misinformation, thus hindering the spread of unethical medical information (Sethi 2017). This is particularly true and relevant when scientific and medical information needs to be popularized. During the Covid-19 pandemic, the proliferation of fake news concerning vaccine information has produced common myths and rumours including, among others, dangerousness of ingredients in vaccines, variants and events reported to the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) caused by vaccination, etc.. For instance, lies and conspiracy theories about Covid-19, which have amassed millions of views and are accessible to young children, have been available on the social media platform TikTok for months. (https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2021/oct/08/revealed-anti-vaccine-tiktok-videos-viewed-children-as-young-as-nine-covid). Starting from these assumptions, the objective of this study is twofold: to analyse the argumentative structure of fake news concerning Covid-19 vaccination and explore the strategies enacted by some official institutions to debunk misinformation. The corpus includes posts published on social media (e.g. Twitter, Tik Tok, Facebook) concerning fake news on Covid-19 vaccines in 2020 and 2021 along with institutional campaigns promoted by the official institutions (WHO; Unicef, etc.) to fight them. Methodology is based on studies on argumentation (Sethi 2017; Kertész, Rákosi 2014; Toulmin 1958) and Multimodal Analysis (Jewitt, C. / Bezemer, J. / Halloran, KL 2016; Gunther K. / van Leeuwen, T. 1996 / 2006. Reading images: the grammar of visual design. London: Routledge; Gunther Kress / Theo van Leeuwen 2001). In short the study will attempt to answer the following research questions: 1) What kind of argumentative structures can be found in misinformation concerning Covid-19 vaccination on social media? 2) What kind of strategies have been enacted by the official institutions to debunk misinformation?
Misinformation through Social Media: The TikTok ‘Debate’ on the COVID-19 Pandemic and the Institutional Reaction
Stefania D'Avanzo
2024
Abstract
Disseminating scientific knowledge involves a high amount of responsibility on the shoulder of its authors. Therefore, it is extremely important to uphold the standards of ethical conduct while writing for a biomedical journal (Bithal 2016). According to the US department of Health and Human Services, scientific misconduct can be defined as plagiarism (presenting author’s ideas without attribution), fabrication (presenting unsubstantiated facts or data) or falsification (changing or selecting certain data to achieve a desired result, misrepresenting evidence, facts, or authorship. In particular, the latter is particularly entangled with the proliferation of scientific culture through the media. Fake news in today’s digital world commands headlines globally. Furthermore, misleading information is shared on social networks and spread across all sorts of social media. Being able to distinguish credible information from alternative facts is fundamental to curbing the dissemination and amplification of such misinformation, thus hindering the spread of unethical medical information (Sethi 2017). This is particularly true and relevant when scientific and medical information needs to be popularized. During the Covid-19 pandemic, the proliferation of fake news concerning vaccine information has produced common myths and rumours including, among others, dangerousness of ingredients in vaccines, variants and events reported to the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) caused by vaccination, etc.. For instance, lies and conspiracy theories about Covid-19, which have amassed millions of views and are accessible to young children, have been available on the social media platform TikTok for months. (https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2021/oct/08/revealed-anti-vaccine-tiktok-videos-viewed-children-as-young-as-nine-covid). Starting from these assumptions, the objective of this study is twofold: to analyse the argumentative structure of fake news concerning Covid-19 vaccination and explore the strategies enacted by some official institutions to debunk misinformation. The corpus includes posts published on social media (e.g. Twitter, Tik Tok, Facebook) concerning fake news on Covid-19 vaccines in 2020 and 2021 along with institutional campaigns promoted by the official institutions (WHO; Unicef, etc.) to fight them. Methodology is based on studies on argumentation (Sethi 2017; Kertész, Rákosi 2014; Toulmin 1958) and Multimodal Analysis (Jewitt, C. / Bezemer, J. / Halloran, KL 2016; Gunther K. / van Leeuwen, T. 1996 / 2006. Reading images: the grammar of visual design. London: Routledge; Gunther Kress / Theo van Leeuwen 2001). In short the study will attempt to answer the following research questions: 1) What kind of argumentative structures can be found in misinformation concerning Covid-19 vaccination on social media? 2) What kind of strategies have been enacted by the official institutions to debunk misinformation?I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
