Partisan Asymmetries in Exposure to Misinformation

Understand

Health misinformation is believed to have contributed to vaccine hesitancy during the Covid-19 pandemic, highlighting concerns about the role of social media in polarization and social stability.

• While previous research has identified a link between political partisanship and misinformation sharing online, the interaction between partisanship and how much misinformation people see within their social networks has not been well studied.
• As a result, we do not know whether partisanship drives exposure to misinformation or people selectively share misinformation despite being exposed to factual content.
• We study Twitter discussions about the Covid-19 pandemic, classifying users ideologically along political and factual dimensions.