Chapter 35 Exercises: Prebunking and Inoculation Theory

Part A: Conceptual Understanding

Exercise 35.1 — Debunking vs. Prebunking

In your own words, explain the difference between debunking and prebunking. Use a concrete example from any domain (health, politics, science, or current events) to illustrate how each approach would handle the same piece of misinformation. What are the strengths and weaknesses of each approach in your example?

Exercise 35.2 — The Continued Influence Effect

A study presents participants with a scenario: a warehouse fire is reported to have been caused by flammable paint cans stored improperly. Later, participants are told the paint cans were not actually there. Despite the correction, participants continue to explain the fire's intensity by referencing the paint cans.

a) Name the cognitive phenomenon this demonstrates. b) What does this phenomenon reveal about the architecture of human memory? c) Propose two strategies a communicator could use to reduce this effect when issuing a correction. d) How does this phenomenon motivate the prebunking approach over the debunking approach?

Exercise 35.3 — McGuire's Biological Metaphor

William McGuire's inoculation theory is built on a biological metaphor. Answer the following:

a) What is the biological process being metaphorically extended? b) Map the elements of the biological process onto the cognitive/attitudinal domain. Specifically: What corresponds to the pathogen? The immune system? The weakened pathogen dose? The developed immunity? c) Identify two ways in which the metaphor is accurate and two ways in which it is misleading or incomplete. d) Suggest an alternative metaphor for inoculation that captures some aspect the biological metaphor misses.

Exercise 35.4 — Forewarning and Refutational Preemption

Inoculation theory holds that two components are necessary for effective inoculation: forewarning and refutational preemption.

a) Define each component in your own words. b) Explain why each component, alone, is insufficient for full inoculation effectiveness. c) Design a 3-sentence inoculation message about social media health misinformation that explicitly incorporates both components. d) How would you test whether both components are necessary? Describe a 2x2 factorial experimental design.

Exercise 35.5 — Identifying Manipulation Techniques

Below are five social media posts. For each, identify the primary FLICC manipulation technique being used and explain your reasoning.

Post A: "A former CDC scientist says vaccines are more dangerous than the diseases they prevent — but you won't hear that from the mainstream media!"

Post B: "Climate scientists have predicted disaster for 50 years and none of their specific predictions have been exactly right. Why should we trust them now?"

Post C: "Thousands of doctors across the country know that this supplement cures cancer. The pharmaceutical companies are suppressing the research to protect their profits."

Post D: "A single study from 1998 shows MMR vaccine causes autism. Big Pharma has funded hundreds of studies since then to bury the original finding."

Post E: "Either you support total lockdowns or you don't care about human life. There's no middle ground here."

Exercise 35.6 — Logic-Based vs. Fact-Based Inoculation

Consider the following scenario: A public health department is preparing for the rollout of a new flu vaccine and anticipates a misinformation campaign. They have limited time and resources.

a) Describe how a fact-based inoculation campaign would approach this situation. b) Describe how a logic-based inoculation campaign would approach this situation. c) Given the constraint of limited time and resources, which approach would you recommend, and why? d) Design a hybrid approach that incorporates both fact-based and logic-based elements. Specify the content, format, and delivery channel.

Part B: Empirical Analysis

Exercise 35.7 — Evaluating Prebunking Research

Read the following (hypothetical) study description and answer the questions below.

Study: Researchers recruited 800 participants online and randomly assigned them to one of three conditions: (1) Bad News game (n = 267), (2) reading a text explanation of manipulation techniques (n = 267), or (3) playing an unrelated puzzle game (n = 266). Before the intervention, all participants rated the credibility of 20 news headlines (10 fake, 10 real). After the intervention, they rated a new set of 20 headlines (10 fake, 10 real). The fake news headlines in the post-test used the same manipulation techniques as those trained in conditions 1 and 2, but with different specific content.

The researchers found that: - Condition 1 (Bad News game): Mean credibility rating of fake news headlines decreased from 3.8 to 3.1 (scale 1-7), d = 0.42 - Condition 2 (text explanation): Mean credibility rating decreased from 3.7 to 3.4, d = 0.18 - Condition 3 (puzzle game): Mean credibility rating was 3.6 pre and 3.5 post, d = 0.06

a) What is the independent variable? What is the dependent variable? b) Why is Condition 3 included? What is it called, and what does it control for? c) What does Cohen's d represent, and how would you interpret the three effect sizes? d) Is the decrease in fake news credibility for Condition 3 a problem for the study's conclusions? Why or why not? e) What follow-up question does this study leave unanswered that you would want to investigate?

Exercise 35.8 — Inoculation Decay

Suppose you have the following data from a longitudinal prebunking study:

a) Calculate the percentage of the immediate inoculation effect that remains at each subsequent time point (use the pre-treatment baseline as reference). b) Sketch a curve illustrating this decay pattern. c) Based on this pattern, when would you recommend delivering a "booster shot"? Justify your recommendation. d) What two hypotheses could explain why the effect decays to near-baseline levels by 8 weeks?

Exercise 35.9 — Google's YouTube Prebunking Campaign

The 2022 Google/Cambridge prebunking campaign in Central and Eastern Europe represents one of the largest real-world tests of prebunking to date.

a) Describe the key methodological features that make this study a "field experiment" rather than a laboratory experiment. b) What are two advantages of a field experiment over a laboratory experiment for studying prebunking? c) What are two limitations of field experiments compared to laboratory experiments? d) The effect sizes in the field experiment (d ≈ 0.20 to 0.30) were smaller than typical laboratory effects. Give two plausible explanations for this difference. e) If you were advising a government that wanted to run a similar campaign, what additional information would you want from this study before proceeding?

Exercise 35.10 — Cross-Cultural Validity

Research by Roozenbeek and colleagues (2022) found that inoculation effects from the Bad News game were present across 19 countries but were somewhat smaller in countries with high existing media literacy.

a) What does this finding suggest about the mechanism by which prebunking works? b) Does this finding mean that prebunking is less valuable in countries with high media literacy? Explain your reasoning. c) How might you modify a prebunking program for use in a country with very low existing media literacy versus very high media literacy? d) What ethical considerations apply to deploying prebunking programs across different cultural contexts?

Part C: Application and Design

Exercise 35.11 — Designing an Inoculation Message

Design a complete inoculation message (forewarning + refutational preemption) for one of the following topics. Your message should be approximately 200-300 words, suitable for reading in under 2 minutes.

Choose one: A. Inoculating against conspiracy-framing misinformation about 5G networks and health. B. Inoculating against fake-expert misinformation about climate change. C. Inoculating against emotional manipulation in anti-vaccine messaging.

For whichever topic you choose: - Clearly identify the manipulation technique being targeted. - Write the forewarning component (alert the reader that this manipulation is coming). - Write the refutational preemption component (show a weakened example and explain why it is manipulative). - Explain how you would test whether your message is effective.

Exercise 35.12 — Prebunking Game Design

You have been commissioned to design a brief prebunking game targeting emotional manipulation in political misinformation. The game should take approximately 10 minutes to play and be suitable for a general adult audience.

Design your game by specifying: a) The game's framing premise (who is the player, what is the setting?). b) The specific manipulation technique being taught. c) Three game scenarios that demonstrate the technique at different levels of subtlety. d) The feedback mechanism: how does the game respond to correct and incorrect player choices? e) The end-game debriefing: what does the player learn after completing all scenarios? f) How you would measure the game's effectiveness in a research study.

Exercise 35.13 — Classroom Prebunking Plan

You are a high school civics teacher planning to incorporate prebunking into your 10th-grade curriculum. You have access to the Bad News game, internet-connected devices for all students, and approximately three 45-minute class periods.

Design a 3-session unit that incorporates the Bad News game. Specify: a) Learning objectives for each session. b) The activity structure for each session (pre-game, game, post-game). c) The discussion questions you would use after each game session. d) How you would assess student learning. e) What pre-existing media literacy knowledge you would assume and what you would need to teach first.

Exercise 35.14 — Public Health Prebunking Campaign

A public health department is planning a prebunking campaign ahead of the launch of a new childhood vaccine. Design the campaign by specifying:

a) The three most likely manipulation techniques that anti-vaccine misinformation will use (based on FLICC and your knowledge of the literature). b) For each technique: one inoculation message (forewarning + refutational preemption) of 100-150 words. c) Delivery channels for the campaign and your rationale for each. d) The target audiences and how the messages might need to be adapted for each. e) An evaluation plan: what outcome measures would indicate success?

Part D: Critical Evaluation

Exercise 35.15 — The Individualism Critique

Some critics argue that prebunking individualizes the misinformation problem, placing the burden of resistance on individuals rather than addressing structural factors (platform design, regulatory frameworks, economic incentives that reward sensationalism).

a) Articulate this critique in your own words, as strongly as possible. b) How would a prebunking researcher respond to this critique? c) Is this critique of prebunking also applicable to other health behavior interventions (e.g., antismoking education, safe sex education)? What does this comparison reveal? d) Propose a policy framework that combines structural approaches with prebunking, arguing for their complementarity rather than their opposition.

Exercise 35.16 — Ethical Analysis of Prebunking at Scale

Google's YouTube prebunking campaign delivered inoculation content to millions of people without their explicit consent, embedded in commercial advertising.

a) Identify at least three ethical concerns raised by this approach. b) How do these concerns compare to the ethical concerns raised by the misinformation that the campaign was designed to counter? c) Apply the principle of informed consent: can prebunking advertising be considered ethically acceptable under any interpretation of informed consent? Explain. d) What governance mechanisms could ensure that at-scale prebunking campaigns are deployed responsibly?

Exercise 35.17 — Comparing Effect Sizes

Prebunking studies typically report effect sizes in the range of d = 0.25 to d = 0.45 for immediate post-treatment outcomes. Critics have argued that these effects are too small to be meaningful. Defenders argue that small effects at scale are meaningful.

a) What is Cohen's d and how should we interpret the values 0.25 and 0.45? b) Using the binomial effect size display (BESD) or a similar heuristic, translate d = 0.35 into a more intuitive statement about what that effect means in practice. c) If a prebunking campaign reached 100 million people with d = 0.30, what would be the practical implications? Calculate an estimate using reasonable assumptions. d) What standards of evidence should we apply to public health interventions regarding misinformation? Are these standards the same as for medical interventions?

Exercise 35.18 — Comparing Debunking and Prebunking

Create a comparison table with the following rows and columns:

Rows: Debunking, Fact-Based Prebunking, Logic-Based Prebunking Columns: Mechanism of action, Scalability, Durability, Evidence base, Optimal use context, Key limitations

Fill in all 18 cells based on the chapter content and your reasoning. Then write a 250-word synthesis explaining which approach or combination of approaches you would recommend for a government seeking to counter a specific, known disinformation campaign about elections.

Part E: Extended Projects

Exercise 35.19 — Literature Review

Write a 1,000-word literature review covering the empirical evidence for inoculation effectiveness. Your review should: - Summarize the findings from at least five studies discussed in this chapter. - Identify patterns in effect sizes across studies. - Identify key moderating variables (what makes inoculation more or less effective?). - Identify the most significant gaps in the current research. - Conclude with a statement of the current state of evidence and what confidence is warranted.

Exercise 35.20 — Research Design Project

Design a complete research study to test the following hypothesis: "Logic-based inoculation delivered via social media advertising maintains significant effects on misinformation susceptibility at 6-week follow-up when supplemented with one booster exposure at 3 weeks."

Your research design should specify: - Study population and recruitment method - Experimental conditions (including all necessary controls) - Outcome measures and measurement instruments - Timeline and procedure - Statistical analysis plan - Potential threats to internal and external validity - Ethical considerations

Exercise 35.21 — Policy Memo

Write a 500-word policy memo from a public health communications advisor to the Secretary of Health. The memo should: - Briefly explain what prebunking is and why it is potentially valuable. - Summarize the strongest evidence for its effectiveness. - Identify the three most significant limitations of the current evidence base. - Make a specific, actionable recommendation about whether and how the department should invest in prebunking as part of its communications strategy. - Address the ethical and political risks of the recommended approach.

Exercise 35.22 — Critique and Response

Read the following (hypothetical) critique and write a 400-word response that defends or constructively modifies the prebunking research program.

Critique: "The prebunking research program suffers from three fatal flaws. First, the effect sizes are small enough that they may not translate to meaningful real-world behavior change. Second, the studies are conducted primarily on WEIRD (Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, Democratic) populations, limiting generalizability. Third, the games and interventions study undergraduate students who are self-selected for interest in media literacy, not the 'hard to reach' populations where prebunking most needs to work. Until these flaws are addressed, prebunking should be treated as a promising research program, not a validated public health tool."*

Exercise 35.23 — Historical Connections

McGuire developed inoculation theory in the context of Cold War-era concerns about communist propaganda and "brainwashing."

a) Describe the Cold War context in which McGuire was working. b) How did this context shape the research questions McGuire asked and the methods he used? c) In what ways is the contemporary misinformation challenge analogous to the propaganda challenges that motivated McGuire's research? d) In what ways is it fundamentally different, requiring new theoretical frameworks or methods?

Exercise 35.24 — Synthesis Essay

Write a 750-1,000 word essay responding to the following prompt:

"Prebunking and inoculation theory represent the most promising approach currently available for reducing the societal harms of misinformation. But a realistic assessment must acknowledge both what the evidence supports and what it does not. Evaluate this claim, drawing on the research reviewed in this chapter."

Your essay should demonstrate command of the empirical evidence, engage with key debates in the field, and arrive at a nuanced, well-reasoned conclusion.

Exercise 35.25 — Reflection Journal

Write a 300-word personal reflection addressing: How has your understanding of how people process and resist misinformation changed after reading this chapter? Identify one belief or assumption you held about misinformation and corrections before reading this chapter that you now regard differently. Describe what specific evidence or argument caused that shift.

End of Chapter 35 Exercises