Rewarding accuracy instead of partisan pandering reduces political divisions over the truth

Researchers argue that the findings hold lessons for social media companies and the -perverse incentives- driving political polarisation online. Shifting the motivations to post on social media could help rebuild some of the shared reality lost to political polarisation Sander van der Linden Offering a tiny cash reward for accuracy, or even briefly appealing to personal integrity, can increase people's ability to tell the difference between misinformation and the truth, according to a new study. The findings suggest that fake news thrives on social media not only because people are tricked into believing it, but also due to a motivational imbalance: users have more incentive to get clicks and likes than to spread accurate content. Social psychologists from the University of Cambridge and New York University argue that their study, published in the journal Nature Human Behaviour , highlights the -perverse incentives- driving shares on social media - particularly in -divisive political climates- such as the United States. They say the psychological pull of pandering to one-s own -in-group- by attacking the other side of a social and political divide is a significant - and often neglected - factor for why so many believe and choose to spread misinformation, or disbelieve accurate news. The study involved four experiments with a total of over 3,300 people from the United States, with equal numbers of Democrats and Republicans. The researchers offered half of participants up to one US dollar if they correctly pointed out true or false headlines, and compared the results to those offered no incentive.