How do children decide when to believe a claim?
UC Berkeley psychologists have presented a somewhat paradoxical partial solution: Expose young children to more misinformation online — not less.
Evan Orticio, a Ph.D. student in UC Berkeley‘s Department of Psychology and lead author of a paper, said, “Doing so in limited circumstances, and with careful oversight and education, can help children gain the tools they’ll need to sort fact from fiction online.”
Orticio believes that since kids naturally question things and face a lot of false information online, it’s essential for adults to teach them how to check facts. Instead of making the internet completely safe, adults should help kids learn to think critically about the information they find.
He says it’s essential for children to practice being skeptical and using critical thinking skills online, especially since they’ll be using the internet a lot in the future.
Orticio and his team conducted two experiments with 122 kids aged 4 to 7 to see how their skepticism changed in different online settings. In the first experiment, kids read an e-book that included both true and false statements about animals. For example, some saw the true statement that zebras have black and white stripes, while others saw a false statement that zebras are red and green.
They then decided whether the claims were true or false. The second experiment simulated search engine results with similar true and false animal facts.
In the next part of the study, kids assessed a new claim about imaginary aliens called Zorpies. They saw pictures of 20 Zorpies, one of which had three eyes, and the rest wore dark sunglasses. The kids had to decide if all Zorpies had three eyes, but they could first check the facts by tapping on the aliens to remove their sunglasses and see their eyes.
The scientists found that kids who had previously seen more false statements about animals were more careful in checking the Zorpies’ claim. In contrast, kids who had more accurate information earlier didn’t feel the need to fact-check much at all. A computer simulation supported this finding, showing that kids exposed to unreliable information were better at spotting misinformation later.
Orticio said, “Children can adapt their level of skepticism according to the quality of information they’ve seen before in a digital context. They can leverage their expectations of how this digital environment works to reasonably adjust how much they trust or distrust information at face value — even if they know nothing about the content itself.”
The project started because there’s a pressing need to understand how kids handle the online world. Research shows that about one-third of children use social media by age 9, and they often come across health misinformation just minutes after creating a TikTok account.
Platforms designed for kids, like YouTube Kids, can have harmful content and misinformation. Orticio points out that parents might think these spaces are safe for their children, but this can create a false sense of security. As the new research reveals, it can lead to kids accepting false information without questioning it.
Orticio said, “Our work suggests that if children have some experience working in controlled, but imperfect, environments where they have experience encountering things that aren’t quite right, and we show them the process for figuring out what is true and not, that will set them up with the expectation to be more vigilant.”
Orticio understands that not all parents have time to monitor their children’s online activities closely. Instead of trying to make the internet completely safe, he suggests that parents talk with their kids about how to check claims and discuss what they see online.
It’s also essential for parents to set clear expectations about what online platforms can and cannot provide.
Orticio emphasizes that the goal isn’t just to make kids more skeptical but also to help them use their skepticism effectively. He points out that while fact-checking in their experiments was simple, it’s much harder in real life, so we need to help kids navigate that challenge.
Journal Reference:
- Orticio, E., Meyer, M. & Kidd, C. Exposure to detectable inaccuracies makes children more diligent fact-checkers of novel claims. Nat Hum Behav (2024). DOI: 10.1038/s41562-024-01992-8