Combating COVID-19 Infodemic on Social Media: A Comparative Institutional Analysis

Combating COVID-19 Infodemic on Social Media: A Comparative Institutional Analysis

Govindaraj Ayyanar, Arjun (TU Delft Technology, Policy and Management)

Correljé, A. (mentor)
Metoui, N. (graduation committee)
van Bergem, R. (graduation committee)

Delft University of Technology

Management of Technology (MoT)

2021-08-27

In recent years, false information on social media platforms has become a centre of attention due to its consequences on elections and public health. COVID-19 has shown how an infodemic fuelled by false information can be detrimental to public health. Existing measures are ineffective. Thus, the thesis takes an exploratory approach from the lens of new institutional economics. A comparative institutional analysis between public health institutions and social media platforms concerning their information discovery process and how differences between them can lead to false information on social media platforms is performed. The findings question whether false information is as widespread on social media platforms as projected, identifies the role of public health institutions and politicians in the spread of false information, how information is regulated on social media platforms and what drives the information discovery process on social media platforms. Based on the comparative institutional analysis, it is recommended to implement prediction markets to address false information on social media platforms.

Fake News
social media platform
False information
Misinformation
Covid-19
Comparative institutional analysis
New Institutional Economics
prediction markets
infodemic
public health institutions
Combatting
Disinformation

http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:a6fc6088-8768-4985-b4cb-3fd9ccb9e379

Student theses

master thesis

© 2021 Arjun Govindaraj Ayyanar