2018/09/16 by Hunt Allcott, Matthew Gentzkow, Allcott, Hunt +3 · 6 citations
Computer Science · Social Sciences · #FOS: Computer and information sciences #FOS: Economics and business #General Economics (econ.GN) #Media Influence and Politics #Misinformation and Its Impacts #Social and Information Networks (cs.SI) #Spam and Phishing Detection
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.1809.05901
openalex publication_date 2018/09/16 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
We measure trends in the diffusion of misinformation on Facebook and Twitter between January 2015 and July 2018. We focus on stories from 570 sites that have been identified as producers of false stories. Interactions with these sites on both Facebook and Twitter rose steadily through the end of 2016. Interactions then fell sharply on Facebook while they continued to rise on Twitter, with the ratio of Facebook engagements to Twitter shares falling by approximately 60 percent. We see no similar pattern for other news, business, or culture sites, where interactions have been relatively stable over time and have followed similar trends on the two platforms both before and after the election.