Spiders caught in a web of Internet lies
It鈥檚 no secret that the internet and social media fuel rampant spread of misinformation in many areas of life. A collective of researchers, including , Postdoctoral Fellow in 91社区鈥檚 Lyman Lab, have explored this phenomenon as it applies to news about spiders. The verdict? Don鈥檛 blindly trust anything you read online about these eight-legged arthropods鈥攐r anything else for that matter鈥攁nd always consider the source.
鈥淭he quality of spider information in the global press is rather poor鈥攅rrors and sensationalism are rampant,鈥� says Stefano Mammola of the National Research Council, Verbania Pallanza, Italy, and University of Helsinki鈥檚 Finnish Museum of Natural History. 鈥淪pider-related information in the press flows through a highly interconnected global network, and the spread of misinformation is driven by a limited number of key factors, the sensationalistic tone of an article being particularly important.鈥�
Starting at the local level
Stefano Mammola said he was inspired to do the study initially based on general disappointment about the quality of spider-related newspaper articles in Italy. 鈥淢any articles on spiders in the Italian press are full of errors, alarmistic, or even fake news, or a combination thereof,鈥� he says.
So, he and dozens of colleagues wanted to see whether this was a global problem. They put together an impressive team of experts to collect all the data, representing 41 languages and 81 countries. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the project also offered a way to explore important questions on a global scale at a time when spider fieldwork had been halted without leaving home to do it.
鈥淲e found that the level of sensationalism and misinformation drops when the 鈥榬ight鈥� expert鈥攏amely an expert on spiders rather than a medical doctor or other professional鈥攊s consulted by journalists doing the writing,鈥� explains Stefano Mammola.
鈥淭his result is actually really encouraging, because it suggests that there is a solution to this problem鈥� explains Catherine Scott. The authors plan to create a global database of arachnologists that are willing to speak to journalists and they are working on a set of guidelines for journalists covering stories about spiders.
The data amassed also showed the importance of events and news coverage on a local scale, as small-town stories can quickly hit the international news. 鈥淚 was particularly surprised by the fact that even very local-scale events鈥攕ay, the story of a farmer bitten by a spider in some remote village in Australia鈥攑ublished by a regional newspaper can quickly become broadcast internationally,鈥� Mammola explains. 鈥淭his implies that improving the quality of the information produced in these local nodes could have a positive effect reverberating across the information network鈥攁 typical example of a 鈥榯hink globally, act locally鈥� management strategy鈥�.
Blowing things out of proportion
Misinformation about spiders has many real-world implications. Some notable cases have led to school closures due to alarmist responses to false widow 鈥渋nvasions,鈥� they report. In another instance, a man lit his house on fire while blowtorching (harmless) spider webs from his backyard. The tone and quality of 鈥渘ews鈥� stories about spiders shape people鈥檚 perception and ideas about them, with implications for them and for spiders鈥� wildlife conservation.
As for next steps, the researchers now want to explore more about how poor-quality information on spiders relates to the persistence of arachnophobic sentiments in the population. They also want to understand better how differences in cultural, social, and other factors influence differences in the way spiders are represented and talked about across various countries and regions. Ultimately, they may even expand the work beyond spiders.
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About this study 鈥溾�� by Stefano Mammola and al., was published in Current Biology. |
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