Calidad de la información o desinformación

Abstract

Introduction: Contributing to research on the quality of news content in the face of a health emergency from a psychosocial perspective is what drives this study to focus on determining the accuracy of COVID-19 information shared via WhatsApp. Objective: To determine whether the quality of information differs between true and false messages about COVID-19 shared via WhatsApp to university students. Methodology: A systematic review of information quality studies was conducted. Subsequently, the Electronic Media Information Quality Scale (EMIQS) was pilot tested. Finally, EMIQS was administered, using a non-experimental, cross-sectional design with a correlational level. Results: There are significant differences between the dimensions of information quality such as source, relevance, credibility, intelligibility and originality; however, differences between the groups of subjects observed are minimal, which indicates that the true message and the false message are evaluated as similar. Conclusion: A message can be constructed with textual and visual elements that can give the impression of being credible, regardless of the falseness or truth of the content, which affects the decision of individuals on how the message should be valued.