Interview: Debunking, correcting misinformation helps but it is not enough to change strong beliefs

Fears about the effects of misinformation on Indian politics seem omnipresent today. Reports suggest huge volumes of “fake news” and misleading content filling up WhatsApp groups and social media feeds, with potentially dangerous consequences. The advent of generative artificial intelligence and “deepfakes” have only made those concerns more immediate.

But how big is the misinformation problem in India? What do we know about it? And what can we do to address it?

In the sixth interview of the CASI Election Conversations 2024, CASI Consulting Editor Rohan Venkat speaks to Sumitra Badrinathan, Assistant Professor of Political Science at American University, about the state of research on the subject, a recent paper of hers that examines efforts to correct misinformation related to vigilante violence in India, and the urgent need for more scholarship examining fake news in the Global South.

Why is it important for us to be studying misinformation, particularly in an Indian context?

Studying misinformation in academia is new. A lot of literature about the topic started after Donald Trump got elected in 2016. And that’s not that long ago, which means there’s a lot we don’t know. If I had to divide misinformation research into three broad questions, I would say that we’re trying to look at:

● What are the...

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