Bad News in the civics classroom : How serious gameplay fosters teenagers’ ability to discern misinformation techniques

• Although the serious game Bad News has been used to inoculate citizens against misinformation, it has not been formally evaluated in traditional classrooms. We therefore evaluated its impact on 516 upper-secondary Swedish students playing individually, paired, or with the whole class. Results show that students improved their ability to discern manipulation techniques in social media posts. Students with prior positive attitudes to credible news sources were better discerners, and this attitude became significantly more positive post-intervention. Rationales for identifying manipulative techniques increased among those who improved their credibility ratings pre-to post-intervention. Lastly, enjoyment of and interest in the intervention was higher in the whole-class setting. This study offers insights for educators on using serious games in formal teaching to foster media and information literacy.

Ämnesord

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Utbildningsvetenskap -- Didaktik (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Educational Sciences -- Didactics (hsv//eng)

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Utbildningsvetenskap (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Educational Sciences (hsv//eng)

Nyckelord

Serious games

inoculation theory

Bad News game

misinformation

computer-supported collaborative learning

classroom intervention

Curriculum Studies

Didaktik

Publikations- och innehållstyp

ref (ämneskategori)

art (ämneskategori)