> I wonder if it would be different if it had come from someone they knew in real life. I guess I shouldn't be at this point, but I'm always surprised that the

> I wonder if it would be different if it had come from someone they knew in real life. I guess I shouldn't be at this point, but I'm always surprised that the people posting the misinformation aren't terribly embarrassed about it when it's revealed. That's an interesting possibility, and I have a small anecdote in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic that is slightly related. My mother, at the older end of the lately maligned "boomer" generation, would often rant with me on the phone about how obviously fake or ridiculous hoaxes were being spread on WhatsApp groups that she participated in. Even though she doesn't have a scientific background, she has a good instinct for the general ideas and how science works, and a very well-honed bullshit detector. After a while, maybe out of lockdown boredom, she started refuting the hoaxes when she could find good sources or science-based arguments to do so... and eventually, some of her friends and acquaintances who did tend to fall for false information, now ask her beforehand if something they have just been shared makes sense or not! Note however that this is not in the US, so at least she doesn't have to contend with overarching partisan identity lines regarding belief in this or that.