Blog #10 - EOTO Illusory Truth Effect

 The Illusory Truth Effect. What is it? "The Illusory Truth Effect also known as the illusion of truth describes how, when we hear the same false information repeated again and again, we often come to believe it is true." (The Decision Lab). With the political climate of today's world and the news coming from different sources and backgrounds, this is in play more than ever. 

 The Illusory Truth Effect was first discussed in a 1977 paper by Lynn Hasher, David Goldstein, and Thomas Toppino. Hasher, Goldstein, and Toppino’s work was the first to demonstrate the power of repetition on belief. They worked in a lab having college students read a list of statements both true and false every two weeks and rated how accurate they believed the statements were. Over the three sessions, the participants rated both true and false statements as more accurate. Later studies would go on to demonstrate that the illusory truth effect occurred even when people had knowledge about the claims they were evaluating. 

 So why does the Illusory Truth Effect have a big impact in today's society? Interest in the Illusory Truth Effect grew in the late 2000s and 2010s, as the internet and social media became more and more important for breaking information to masses of people. It became a particularly popular research topic after the 2016 US Presidential election when questions were swirling about the influence of foreign countries on the results of the election. Research showed that the illusory truth effect most likely played a role in people’s acceptance of false stories on social media and on different news outlets such as CNN or Fox News.

Ever since President Trump took office in 2017 and during his campaign in 2016, the term "Fake News" has been everywhere. It also caused a lot of people to question whether the news they were receiving was really the truth or if it was just what they wanted to believe. The internet is a gold mine for false rumors, conspiracy theories, and outright lies, and none of us are immune to seeing them. According to a study published in the journal "Science", on average, false stories reach 1,500 people six times faster than true stories do. They’re also 70 percent more likely to be retweeted than real stories. Because of social media's influence on us and how often people use it, it is inevitable that all of us will encounter "fake news" at some point, and in fact, we probably do so on a very regular basis. This alone puts us at risk of the illusory truth effect.

 Clearly, the problem is not a lack of awareness when looking at the news, people know that unreliable information circulates all over the internet. It seems that people just don’t believe that they would ever fall for those stories and believe false information. It’s important to be aware of the illusory truth effect, and other things that may affect our judgment. When reading or watching the news wherever you may get it,  think a bit more critically about the information you are receiving and question whether you find that information to be true or not.