CITIZEN'S POLITICAL DISTRUST: THE ROLE OF GROWING MISINFORMATION
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.53555/nnssh.v8i5.1265Keywords:
Misinformation, political distrust, citizens, democratic governanceAbstract
Political distrust is a global phenomenon that substantially burdens democratic governance, instigates political, ethnic, social, and personal division, and exposes a nation to underdevelopment. The trend is perversive across the world. While researchers have identified multiple reasons for political distrust, the role of misinformation in political distrust has not received much literature attention. The present study examines citizens' political distrust based on the growing misinformation in contemporary society. Five hundred and twenty-eight youths (n=528) were conveniently selected from different locations in the Enugu States as the respondents. Data for the survey was collected using a self-report measure assessing political distrust and misinformation. Linear regression analysis was conducted on the data, and the result showed that misinformation statistically significantly predicted citizens' political distrust. The study concludes that misinformation is a significant contributory factor in political distrust among the citizens of Nigeria.
References
Bahja, M., & Safdar, G. A. (2020). Unlink the link between COVID-19 and 5G Networks: an NLP and SNA-based Approach. IEEE Access. https://doi.org/10.1109/ACCESS.2020.3039168
Baptista, J. P., & Gradim, A. (2021). "Brave New World" of Fake News: How It Works. In Javnost (Vol. 28, Issue 4). https://doi.org/10.1080/13183222.2021.1861409
Bertsou, E. (2019). Rethinking political distrust. European Political Science Review, 11(2). https://doi.org/10.1017/S1755773919000080
Bullock, J. (2006). Partisanship and the enduring effects of false political information. 2006 Meetings of the Western Political Science Association and the Midwest Political Science Association.
Collins, B., Hoang, D. T., Nguyen, N. T., & Hwang, D. (2021). Trends in combating fake news on social media–a survey. Journal of Information and Telecommunication, 5(2). https://doi.org/10.1080/24751839.2020.1847379
Enders, A. M., Uscinski, J. E., Seelig, M. I., Klofstad, C. A., Wuchty, S., Funchion, J. R., Murthi, M. N., Premaratne, K., & Stoler, J. (2021). The Relationship Between Social Media Use and Beliefs in Conspiracy Theories and Misinformation. Political Behavior. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11109-021-09734-6
Fried, A. (2006). Why trust matters: Declining political trust and the demise of American liberalism. Perspectives on Politics, 4(01). https://doi.org/10.1017/s1537592706490149
Gordon, A., Ecker, U. K. H., & Lewandowsky, S. (2019). Polarity and attitude effects in the continued-influence paradigm. Journal of Memory and Language, 108. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jml.2019.104028
Goreis, A., & Kothgassner, O. D. (2020). Social media is a vehicle for conspiracy beliefs on COVID-19. Digital Psychology, 1(2). https://doi.org/10.24989/dp.v1i2.1866
Herrero-Diz, P., Conde-Jiménez, J., & Reyes de Cózar, S. (2020). Teens’ motivations to spread fake news on WhatsApp. Social Media and Society, 6(3). https://doi.org/10.1177/2056305120942879
Hooghe, M., & Dassonneville, R. (2018). A Spiral of Distrust: A Panel Study on the Relation between Political Distrust and Protest Voting in Belgium. Government and Opposition, 53(1). https://doi.org/10.1017/gov.2016.18
Huang, H. (2017). A War of (Mis)Information: The Political Effects of Rumors and Rumor Rebuttals in an Authoritarian Country. British Journal of Political Science, 47(2). https://doi.org/10.1017/S0007123415000253
Khurana, P., Kumar, D., & Kumar, S. (2019). Research of fake news spreading through WhatsApp. International Journal of Innovative Technology and Exploring Engineering, 8(6 Special Issue 4). https://doi.org/10.35940/ijitee.F1193.0486S419
Lewandowsky, S., & van der Linden, S. (2021). Countering Misinformation and Fake News Through Inoculation and Prebunking. European Review of Social Psychology, 32(2). https://doi.org/10.1080/10463283.2021.1876983
Mishler, W., & Rose, R. (2001). What are the origins of political trust? Testing institutional and cultural theories in post-communist societies. Comparative Political Studies, 34(1). https://doi.org/10.1177/0010414001034001002
Nnaemeka, E., & Richard, D. (2020). Evaluative study of the use of WhatsApp in the spread of fake news in Owerri metropolis. In Idia: Journal of Mass Communication (Vol. 5).
Nyhan, B., & Reifler, J. (2015). Displacing Misinformation about Events: An Experimental Test of Causal Corrections. Journal of Experimental Political Science, 2(1). https://doi.org/10.1017/XPS.2014.22
Rahbarqazi, M., & Mahmoudoghli, R. (2021). Modeling social media effects on political distrust in Lebanon. Communication and Society, 34(3). https://doi.org/10.15581/003.34.3.89-102
Rothstein, B., & Stolle, D. (2008). The state and social capital: An institutional theory of generalized trust. In Comparative Politics (Vol. 40, Issue 4). https://doi.org/10.5129/001041508x12911362383354
Samuel, U. T. (2021). The Proliferation of Small Arms and Light Weapons and the Challenges of National Security in Nigeria: A Case Study of Adamawa State. Asian Research Journal of Arts & Social Sciences. https://doi.org/10.9734/arjass/2021/v14i330238
Tambuscio, M., Oliveira, D. F. M., Ciampaglia, G. L., & Ruffo, G. (2018). Network segregation is a model of misinformation and fact-checking. Journal of Computational Social Science, 1(2). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42001-018-0018-9
Thorson, E. (2016). Belief Echoes: The Persistent Effects of Corrected Misinformation. Political Communication, 33(3). https://doi.org/10.1080/10584609.2015.1102187
Unger, W. (2021). How the Poor Data Privacy Regime Contributes to Misinformation Spread and Democratic Erosion. Science and Technology Law Review, 22(2). https://doi.org/10.52214/stlr.v22i2.8668
Valenzuela, S., Halpern, D., Katz, J. E., & Miranda, J. P. (2019). The Paradox of Participation Versus Misinformation: Social Media, Political Engagement, and the Spread of Misinformation. Digital Journalism, 7(6). https://doi.org/10.1080/21670811.2019.1623701
Van Bavel, J. J., Harris, E. A., Pärnamets, P., Rathje, S., Doell, K. C., & Tucker, J. A. (2021). Political Psychology in the Digital (mis)Information age: A Model of News Belief and Sharing. Social Issues and Policy Review, 15(1). https://doi.org/10.1111/sipr.12077
Vincent, C. S., & Gismo, A. (2021). Fake news, reality apathy, and the erosion of trust and authenticity in American politics. In Democracy in the Disinformation Age: Influence and Activism in American Politics. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003008828-7
Wardle, C., & Derakhshan, H. (2017). Information disorder: Toward an interdisciplinary framework for research and policymaking. Council of Europe Report.
Yustitia, S., & Asharianto, P. D. (2020). Misinformation and Disinformation of COVID-19 on Social Media in Indonesia. https://doi.org/10.31098/pss.v1i1.180
Published
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2022 Journal of Advance Research in Social Science and Humanities
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
You are free to:
- Share — copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format for any purpose, even commercially.
- Adapt — remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially.
- The licensor cannot revoke these freedoms as long as you follow the license terms.
Under the following terms:
- Attribution — You must give appropriate credit , provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made . You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your use.
- No additional restrictions — You may not apply legal terms or technological measures that legally restrict others from doing anything the license permits.
Notices:
You do not have to comply with the license for elements of the material in the public domain or where your use is permitted by an applicable exception or limitation .
No warranties are given. The license may not give you all of the permissions necessary for your intended use. For example, other rights such as publicity, privacy, or moral rights may limit how you use the material.
