Prebunking Crisis Misinformation Online: The Mediation Effect of Spokesperson Connection and Perceived Correction Quality on Publics' Communicative Responses

Abstract

While narrative is regarded as a powerfully persuasive tool in previous crisis communication literature, few empirical studies in crisis misinformation correction have examined the danger of narrative-based misinformation about an organizational crisis and how an organization might correct it via prebunking strategies using narratives. Thus, contextualized in an organizational misinformation crisis, this study examined the informational competition between crisis misinformation narrative and organizational prebunking narrative, as well as identified viable ways of using organizational narrative persuasion as a robust prebunking messaging strategy, via the mediation effects of character connection and perceived information quality, to reduce misinformation discussion on social media and increase publics' social correction intention. An online experiment with 1 (Misinformation: blame narrative) × 4 (Organizational prebunking message: blame narrative vs. victim narrative vs. renewal narrative vs. nonnarrative correction) between-subjects design was conducted with 352 US adults. Key findings include: (1) the narrative strategy included in the prebunking message exhibited limited direct effects on participants' communicative behaviors; (2) identification with the spokesperson had more impact than perceived correction quality on participants' communicative behaviors (i.e., misinformation discussion and social correction); and (3) participants' liking of the spokesperson (not trust) was positively associated with their character identification with the spokesperson. Theoretical and practical implications are further discussed in terms of the potential for using a solid persuasive tool -- narrative --to combat misinformation narrative through communicative behaviors, as well as the mechanism behind the competition between misinformation and corrective information.