Mitigating Misinformation Sharing on Social Media through Personalised Nudging

The ongoing challenge of misinformation on social media motivates ongoing efforts to find effective countermeasures. In this study, we evaluated the potential of personalised nudging to reduce the sharing of misinformation on social media, as personalised support has been successfully applied in other areas of critical information handling. In an online experiment (N = 396) exposing users to social media posts, we assessed the degree of misinformation sharing between groups receiving (1) no nudges, (2) non-personalised nudges, and (3) personalised nudges. Personalisation was based on three psychometric dimensions - general decision-making style, consideration of future consequences, need for cognition - to assign the most appropriate nudge from a pool of five nudges. The results showed significant differences (p < .05) between all three groups, with the personalised nudge group sharing the least misinformation. Detailed analyses at the nudge level revealed that one nudge was universally effective and two nudges were effective only in their personalised form. The results generally confirm the potential of personalisation, although the effect is limited in scope. These findings shed light on the nuanced results of nudging studies, highlight the benefits of personalisation, and raise ethical considerations regarding the privacy implications of personalisation and those inherent in nudges.