Why retractions of numerical misinformation fail: The anchoring effect of inaccurate numbers in the news
- Author(s)
- Marlis Stubenvoll, Jörg Matthes
- Abstract
Numbers can convey critical information about political issues, yet statistics are sometimes cited incorrectly by political actors. Drawing on real-world examples of numerical misinformation, the current study provides a first test of the anchoring bias in the context of news consumption. Anchoring describes how evidently wrong and even irrelevant numbers might change people’s judgments. Results of a survey experiment with a sample of N = 413 citizens indicate that even when individuals see a retraction and distrust the presented misinformation, they stay biased toward the initially seen inaccurate number.
- Organisation(s)
- Department of Communication
- Journal
- Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly
- Volume
- 99
- Pages
- 368–389
- No. of pages
- 22
- ISSN
- 1077-6990
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1177/10776990211021800
- Publication date
- 06-2021
- Peer reviewed
- Yes
- Austrian Fields of Science 2012
- 508007 Communication science
- Keywords
- ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Communication
- Portal url
- https://ucrisportal.univie.ac.at/en/publications/0872e188-6701-43fa-92eb-fe141cda41fb