Effects of childhood environments on the discernment of health misinformation

The wide dissemination of COVID-19 and other health misinformation poses a significant threat to individuals' well-being. We investigated how two key features of childhood environments, uncertainty and harshness, influence individuals’ ability to distinguish COVID-19 and other health-related truths from misinformation (i.e., accuracy discernment and sharing discernment). Across four studies (including two preregistered studies, total N = 4874), we found that greater childhood uncertainty was associated with worse accuracy discernment and sharing discernment, whereas greater childhood harshness was associated with better accuracy discernment. We also found that the associations between childhood environments and discernment were mediated by analytic thinking (Studies 1–3). Furthermore, recalling or imagining uncertain childhood events led to a decrease in sharing discernment (Study 4). These findings offer insight into how childhood environments influence the ability to discern truth from falsehood on social media later in life, which may contribute to the establishment of corresponding interventions to combat the negative impact of misinformation on public health.