Do you have any examples of encounters you’ve had that have “backfired” when you present evidence to counter false information?

Two related and significant problems are presented in the book this week. Judgments based on false information and the backfire effect. Particularly, recent research has made clear that social media users are pretty shockingly bad at using critical thinking to assess the the validity of information they encounter online. Click the link for more studies concerning this issue https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/11/23/503129818/study-finds-students-have-dismaying-inability-to-tell-fake-news-from-real.

These findings alone are scary enough, but what’s worse, there is a phenomenon called the backfire effect that can exacerbate the problem related to false information. Discuss both of these issues. Do you have any examples of encounters you’ve had that have “backfired” when you present evidence to counter false information? Is there anything we can do to combat the influence of false information online and/or the backfire effect? Or is it hopeless?

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