Understanding fake news during the Covid-19 health crisis from the perspective of information behaviour: The case of Spain

Abstract

The health crisis brought about by Covid-19 has generated a heightened need for information as a response to a situation of uncertainty and high emotional load, in which fake news and other informative content have grown dramatically. The aim of this work is to delve into the understanding of fake news from the perspective of information behaviour by analysing a sample of fake news items that were spread in Spain during the Covid-19 health crisis. A sample of 242 fake news items was collected from the Maldita.es website and analysed according to the criteria of cognitive and affective authority, interactivity, themes and potential danger. The results point to a practical absence of indicators of cognitive authority (53.7%), while the affective authority of these news items is built through mechanisms of discrediting people, ideas or movements (40.7%) and, secondarily, the use of offensive or coarse language (17.7%) and comparison or reference to additional information sources (26.6%). Interactivity features allow commenting in 24.3% of the cases. The dominant theme is society (43.1%), followed by politics (26.4%) and science (23.6%). Finally, fake news, for the most part, does not seem to pose any danger to the health or safety of people – the harm it causes is intangible and moral. The author concludes by highlighting the importance of a culture of civic values to combat fake news.