Social media’s individualized, instant, and streamlined communication provides users with up-to-date information on world events, community opinions, and trending memes. However, with the uptick in AI-generated content and extremist views, social media can be incredibly deceptive, with the gap between fact and fiction looming larger and larger. Most recently, the New York Times reported that misleading information regarding the Israel-Hamas war has impaired the authenticity of news outlets and social networks, such as X (formerly known as Twitter), Instagram, and more. Misinformation and social division influence one another, perpetuating a cycle of increasingly polarizing views. At its core, misinformation can be defined as a type of illusion, where perception and interpretation are at odds with reality. To understand the fundamental techniques of illusionary observation and thought, researchers at the State University of New York Downstate Health Sciences investigated how magicians deceive their audience. These findings are key to discovering how to best combat misinformation, either as an audience member at a thrilling magician showcase or as a consumer of global digitized news.
Due to the finite amount of information humans process at a given time, psychologists believe that “attention” is a method used to emphasize a particular part of sensory information. As our attention shifts toward the item of focus, the human attentional system clouds the importance of everything else in that setting. Magicians take advantage of our narrow attentional system by utilizing a number of techniques that overwhelm our processes. For example, a sleight-of-hand technique along with storytelling might emotionally and cognitively engage the audience; while the audience is distracted, a gesture is likely to go unnoticed. Similarly, social media users are inclined to miss slight disconnections or reframings of a story when they are overwhelmed with information. Research suggests that watching videos containing multiple moving parts can prevent people from noticing important shifts in data. When moving parts are presented in rapid succession, it is also likely that viewers are unable to verify the accuracy and fact-check the information presented. This is a dangerous phenomenon in media consumerism, especially when streamlined information is received on a small ever-changing screen. The themes within images, videos, and text are viewed amidst a busy workday, resulting in a lack of time and effort to verify facts and shifts in developing stories.
“Confirmation bias — a term used to describe people who search for, interpret, or recall data that supports their beliefs — can often push people to disengage from differing information and new perspectives.”
Our internal illusions — prior biases, expectations, and memories — heavily influence our concluding thoughts and values. Magicians use these illusions to predict the audience’s understanding of a particular trick, concealing a palmed coin or making a coin reappear. In the same way, we tend to trust information that is consistent with our preexisting ideals and notions. Confirmation bias — a term used to describe people who search for, interpret, or recall data that supports their beliefs — can often push people to disengage from differing information and new perspectives. Ultimately, users may reach a state of “social media fatigue” as new contradicting, unfamiliar, and uncomfortable information surfaces. However, to manipulate our biases, magicians use the power of repetition to overshadow our memories, recasting our experiences and then repeating these false events. Researchers propose that the repetition of highly irrational and implausible facts strengthens its credibility. In parallel, the way in which we process and encode memories can permanently shape our perception of an experience. Thus, although users can follow organizations, influencers, and brands, or interact with content they enjoy, their algorithm is still regulated to regurgitate the same information.
To battle these forms of misinformation, experts encourage creating an identifier to mark potentially inaccurate information. While this strategy may minimize the spread of misinformation, it doesn’t completely prevent the issue. Researchers also found that viewers of media will often ignore the warnings altogether. In contrast, when people come to view these warnings as indicators of inaccurate posts, they might mistakenly assume that any post lacking a warning is accurate, when, in reality, that is not the case.
Similar to the audiences at magician exhibits, it seems we are no better than unaware, mindless audience members, vulnerable to the exploitation of perceptive and cognitive illusions. The reduction and elimination of misinformation, though tricky, requires a multifaceted approach, researchers say — one that has the rigor to battle deceptive media monopolies.
