The Costs of Governing Truth: Fact-Checking, Perceived Censorship, and Political Participation Across Governance Contexts

This study examines how concerns about deepfakes, fact-checking, and perceived censorship on social media shape online political participation in AI-mediated information environments. Using survey data from Singapore, China, and the United States, we find that fact-checking behavior is positively associated with political participation across all contexts, whereas deepfake concerns have no direct effect. Importantly, perceived censorship conditions this relationship: under high perceived censorship, highly active fact-checkers who are concerned about deepfakes are more likely to disengage from political participation. The findings highlight perceived censorship as a tipping point at which participatory agency collapses into political withdrawal, even among motivated fact-checkers.