The role of intellectual humility in predicting investigative behavioral tendencies in COVID-19 vaccine news

Abu Bakar  Fahmi; Abdul Majid  Utama

doi:10.22219/jipt.v10i2.20241

Authors

Abu Bakar Fahmi Faculty of Psychology, University of Muhammadiyah Prof. Dr. Hamka, Jakarta, Indonesia
Abdul Majid Utama Faculty of Psychology, University of Muhammadiyah Prof. Dr. Hamka, Jakarta, Indonesia

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.22219/jipt.v10i2.20241

Keywords:

covid-19, fake news, intellectual humility, investigative behavior, pandemic

Abstract

During Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, the spread of fake news on social media occurred massively. To avoid any negative impacts, people are expected to exhibit investigative behavior towards the news they encounter, including conducting fact checks. Previous research has shown that intellectual humility can influence investigative behavior when exposed to fake news about COVID-19. This study aims to examine intellectual humility’s ability to predict investigative behavior when dealing with news about the COVID-19 vaccine. The study involved 227 students (157 female and 70 male, M = 21, SD = 1.19) as respondents who were selected by convenience sampling. The instruments used in revealing the two variables are the General Intellectual Humility Scale, headlines of news articles about the COVID-19 vaccine, and the scale of investigative behavior tendencies towards news about the COVID-19 vaccine. The results showed that intellectual humility could predict investigative behavior towards fake (B = 0.89; 95% CI [0,62, 1,15], p < 0,001) and fact news headlines (B = 0,87; 95% CI [0,60, 1,15], p < 0,001) about the COVID-19 vaccine. This finding implies that higher intellectual humility in individuals is predicted to increase investigative behavior towards news about the COVID-19 vaccine.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

References

Angeline, M., Safitri, Y., & Luthfia, A. (2020). Can the damage be undone? analyzing misinformation during COVID-19 outbreak in Indonesia. Proceedings of 2020 International Conference on Information Management and Technology, ICIMTech 2020, August, 360–364. https://doi.org/10.1109/ICIMTech50083.2020.9211124

Annur, C. M. (2022). Masyarakat makin sadar bahaya hoaks Covid-19. Katadata. Retrieved from https://katadata.co.id/ariayudhistira/analisisdata/61d6b13b24859/masyarakat-makin-sadar-bahaya-hoaks-covid-1 (accessed 05 April 2022)

APA. (2020). Five ways to view coverage of the coronavirus. Retrieved from https://www.apa.org/topics/covid-19/view-coverage (accessed 05 April 2022)

Bayer, J. B., Trieu, P., & Ellison, N. B. (2020). Social media elements, ecologies, and effects. Annual Review of Psychology, 1–27. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-psych-010419-

Brennen, J. S., Simon, F. M., Howard, P. N., & Nielsen, R. K. (2020). Types, sources, and claims of covid-19 misinformation. Factsheet, April(2020), 1–13. Retrieved from http://www.primaonline.it/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/COVID-19_reuters.pdf (accessed 05 April 2022)

Bronstein, M. V., Pennycook, G., Bear, A., Rand, D. G., & Cannon, T. D. (2018). Belief in fake news is associated with delusionality, dogmatism, religious fundamentalism, and reduced analytic thinking. Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition, 8(1), 108–117. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jarmac.2018.09.005

Bronstein, M. V., Pennycook, G., Buonomano, L., & Cannon, T. D. (2021). Belief in fake news, responsiveness to cognitive conflict, and analytic reasoning engagement. Thinking and Reasoning, 27(4), 510–535. https://doi.org/10.1080/13546783.2020.1847190

Browning, M. H. E. M., Larson, L. R., Sharaievska, I., Rigolon, A., McAnirlin, O., Mullenbach, L., Cloutier, S., Vu, T. M., Thomsen, J., Reigner, N., Metcalf, E. C., D’Antonio, A., Helbich, M., Bratman, G. N., & Alvarez, H. O. (2021). Psychological impacts from COVID-19 among university students: Risk factors across seven states in the United States. PloS One, 16(1), e0245327. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0245327

Carr, C. T., & Hayes, R. A. (2015). Social media: Defining, developing, and divining. Atlantic Journal of Communication, 23(1), 46–65. https://doi.org/10.1080/15456870.2015.972282

De keersmaecker, J., & Roets, A. (2017). ‘Fake news’: Incorrect, but hard to correct. The role of cognitive ability on the impact of false information on social impressions. Intelligence, 65(June), 107–110. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.intell.2017.10.005

Deffler, S. A., Leary, M. R., & Hoyle, R. H. (2016). Knowing what you know: Intellectual humility and judgments of recognition memory. Personality and Individual Differences, 96, 255–259.https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2016.03.016

Du, J., & Cai, Y. (2020). Owning one’s intellectual limitations: A review of intellectual humility. Psychology, 11, 1009–1020. https://doi.org/10.4236/psych.2020.117066

Effron, D. A., & Raj, M. (2020). Misinformation and morality: Encountering fake-news headlines makes them seem less unethical to publish and share. Psychological Science, 31(1), 75–87. https://doi.org/10.1177/0956797619887896

El Keshky, M. E. S., Basyouni, S. S., & Al Sabban, A. M. (2020). Getting through covid-19: The pandemic’s impact on the psychology of sustainability, quality of life, and the global economy – A systematic review. Frontiers in Psychology, 11(November), 1–12. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.585897

Gabarron, E., Oyeyemi, S. O., & Wynn, R. (2021). Covid-19-related misinformation on social media: A systematic review. Btextit{ulletin of the World Health Organization, 99}(6), 455-463A. https://doi.org/10.2471/BLT.20.276782

Greene, C. M.,& Murphy, G. (2021). Quantifying the effects of fake news on behavior: Evidence from a study of COVID-19 misinformation. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied. https://doi.org/10.1037/xap0000371

Greifeneder, R., Jaffé, M. E., Newman, E. J. and, & Schwarz, N. (2021). What is news and true about fake news? In R. Greifeneder, M. E. Jaffé, E. J. and Newman, & N. Schwarz (Eds.), The Psychology of fake news: Accepting, sharing, and correcting misinformation. Routledge.

Hadlington, L., Harkin, L. J., Kuss, D., Newman, K., & Ryding, F. C. (2022). Perceptions of fake news, misinformation, and disinformation amid the COVID-19 pandemic: A qualitative exploration. Psychology of Popular Media. https://doi.org/10.1037/ppm0000387

Hwang, J., Borah, P., Shah, D., & Brauer, M. (2021). The relationship among covid-19 information seeking, news media use, and emotional distress at the onset of the pandemic. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 18(24), 1–13. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph182413198

Kemenkominfo. (2020). Hasil survei Indeks Literasi Digital Nasional 2020, akses internet makin terjangkau. Retrieved from https://kominfo.go.id/content/detail/30928/siaran-pers-no-149hmkominfo112020-tentang-hasil-survei-indeks-literasi-digital-nasional-2020-akses-internet-makin-terjangkau/0/siaran_pers (accessed 04 April 2022)

Kemkominfo. (2022). Penanganan sebaran konten hoaks Covid-19 Sabtu . Retrieved from https://kominfo.go.id/content/detail/39806/penanganan-sebaran-konten-hoaks-covid-19-sabtu-05022022/0/infografis (accessed 05 February 2022)

Koetke, J., Schumann, K., & Porter, T. (2021). Intellectual humility predicts scrutiny of covid-19 misinformation. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 13(1), 277–284. https://doi.org/10.1177/1948550620988242

Krumrei-Mancuso, E. J., Haggard, M. C., Labouff, J. P., Haggard, M. C., & Labouff, J. P. (2020). Links between intellectual humility and acquiring knowledge. The Journal of Positive Psychology, 15(2), 155–170. https://doi.org/10.1080/17439760.2019.1579359

Krumrei-Mancuso, E. J., & Newman, B. (2020). Intellectual humility in the sociopolitical domain. Self and Identity, 19}(8), 989–1016. https://doi.org/10.1080/15298868.2020.1714711

Lazer, D. M. J., Baum, M. A., Benkler, Y., Berinsky, A. J., Greenhill, K. M., Menczer, F., Metzger, M. J., Nyhan, B., Pennycook, G., Rothschild, D., Schudson, M., Sloman, S. A., Sunstein, C. R., Thorson, E. A., Watts, D. J., & Zittrain, J. L. (2018). The science of fake news. Science, 359(}6380), 1094–1096. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aao2998

Leary, M. R. (2018). The Psychology of Intellectual Humility} (Issue September). Retrieved from https://www.templeton.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Intellectual-Humility-Leary-FullLength-Final.pdf (accessed 05 February 2022)

Leary, M. R., Diebels, K. J., Davisson, E. K., Jongman-sereno, K. P., Isherwood, J. C., Raimi, K. T., Deffler, S. A., & Hoyle, R. H. (2017). Cognitive and Interpersonal Features of Intellectual Humility. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 43(6), 793–813. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167217697695

Merchant, R. M., & Lurie, N. (2020). Social media and emergency preparedness in response to Novel Coronavirus. JAMA - Journal of the American Medical Association, 323}(20), 2011–2012. https://doi.org/10.1001/jama.2020.4469

Montagni, I., Ouazzani-Touhami, K., Mebarki, A., Texier, N., Schück, S., & Tzourio, C. (2021). Acceptance of a Covid-19 vaccine is associated with ability to detect fake news and health literacy. textit{Journal of Public Health, 4(4), 695–702. https://doi.org/10.1093/pubmed/fdab028

Nurrahmi, F., & Syam, H. M. (2020). Perilaku Informasi Mahasiswa dan Hoaks di Media Sosial. textit{Communicatus: Jurnal Ilmu Komunikasi, 4(2), 129–146. https://doi.org/10.15575/cjik.v4i2.9215

PAHO. (2020). Understanding the infodemic and misinformation in the fight against COVID-19. In Pan American Health Organization. Retrieved from https://iris.paho.org/bitstream/handle/10665.2/52052/Factsheet-infodemic_eng.pdf (accessed 05 February 2022)

Pennycook, G., McPhetres, J., Zhang, Y., Lu, J. G., & Rand, D. G. (2020). Fighting COVID-19 misinformation on social media: Experimental evidence for a scalable accuracy-nudge intervention. Psychological Science, 31(7), 770–780. https://doi.org/10.1177/0956797620939054

Pennycook, G., & Rand, D. G. (2019). Lazy, not biased: Susceptibility to partisan fake news is better explained by lack of reasoning than by motivated reasoning. Cognition, 188(June), 39–50. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2018.06.011

Pennycook, G., & Rand, D. G. (2020). Who falls for fake news? The roles of bullshit receptivity, overclaiming, familiarity, and analytic thinking. Journal of Personality, 88(2), 185–200. https://doi.org/10.1111/JOPY.12476

Pennycook, G., & Rand, D. G. (2021). The psychology of fake news. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 25(5), 388–402. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2021.02.007

Porter, T., Schumann, K., Selmeczy, D., & Trzesniewski, K. (2020). Intellectual humility predicts mastery behaviors when learning. Learning and Individual Differences, 80(March), 101888.https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lindif.2020.101888

Saladino, V., Algeri, D., & Auriemma, V. (2020). The psychological and social impact of covid-19: New perspectives of well-being. Frontiers in Psychology, 11(October). https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.577684

Satuan Tugas Penanganan COVID-19. (2021). Data Vaksinasi COVID-19. Retrieved from https://covid19.go.id/p/berita/data-vaksinasi-covid-19-update-5-juli-2021 (accessed 5 July 2021)

Siebenhaar, K. U., Köther, A. K., & Alpers, G. W. (2020). Dealing with the COVID-19 infodemic: Distress by information, information avoidance, and compliance with preventive measures. Frontiers in Psychology, 11(November), 1–11. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.567905

Sindermann, C., Cooper, A., & Montag, C. (2020). A short review on susceptibility to falling for fake political news. Current Opinion in Psychology, 36, 44–48. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.copsyc.2020.03.014

Taylor, S. (2019). The Psychology of pandemics: Preparing for the next global outbreak of infectious disease. Cambridge Scholars Publishing.

The Lancet. (2020). The COVID-19 infodemic. The Lancet Infectious Diseases, 20(August 2020), 87. https://doi.org/10.1016%2FS1473-3099(20)30565-X

We Are Social & Hootsuite. (2021). Digital 2021: Indonesia. Retrieved from https://datareportal.com/reports/digital-2021-indonesia (accessed 5 July 2021)

WHO. (2020). Impact of COVID-19 on people’s livelihoods, their health and our food systems. Retrieved from https://www.who.int/news/item/13-10-2020-impact-of-covid-19-on-people%27s-livelihoods-their-health-and-our-food-systems (accessed 5 July 2021)

WHO. (2021). Social media and COVID-19: A global study of digital crisis interaction among Gen Z and millennials.

Wiederhold, B. K. (2020). Using social media to our advantage: Alleviating anxiety during a pandemic. Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, 23(4), 197–198. https://doi.org/10.1089/cyber.2020.29180.bkw

Wu, L., Morstatter, F., Carley, K. M., & Liu, H. (2019). Misinformation in social media: definition, manipulation, and detection. ACM SIGKDD Explorations Newsletter, 21(2), 80–90. https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/21/technology/fact-

Zarocostas, J. (2020). How to fight an infodemic. Lancet (London, England), 395}(February 29, 2020), 676. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(20)30461-X

Zmigrod, L., Zmigrod, S., Rentfrow, P. J., & Robbins, T. W. (2019). The psychological roots of intellectual humility: The role of intelligence and cognitive flexibility. Personality and Individual Differences, 141, 200–208. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2019.01.016