Spelling Errors and Shouting Capitalization Lead to Additive Penalties to Trustworthiness of Online Health Information: Randomized Experiment With Laypersons.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The written format and literacy competence of screen-based texts can interfere with the perceived trustworthiness of health information in online forums, independent of the semantic content. Unlike in professional content, the format in unmoderated forums can regularly hint at incivility, perceived as deliberate rudeness or casual disregard toward the reader, for example, through spelling errors and unnecessary emphatic capitalization of whole words (online shouting).

Objective

This study aimed to quantify the comparative effects of spelling errors and inappropriate capitalization on ratings of trustworthiness independently of lay insight and to determine whether these changes act synergistically or additively on the ratings.

Methods

In web-based experiment

SUBMITTER: Witchel HJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7315370 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature