Professional Documents
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Final Workshop 3 2
Final Workshop 3 2
Thierry Labossiere
ENC1102
Abstract
Many people around the world are going through a dystopian crisis in which lives are
being lost by the days due to the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic that has killed millions. Each
country has relied on scientific studies on Covid-19 to prevent the increase of the continuous
spread of the disease among its citizens. Throughout the world, countries have performed certain
measures to decrease the number of cases of the diseases, in hopes of time will be on their side
for vaccination to be available for the citizens. In today’s society, the realm of technology has
provided its benefits regarding spreading out information for citizens, especially social media
users, as well as its problems when some of this information can consist of false rhetoric. In this
paper, I'll exhibit a case on the importance of misinformation on Covid-19 can cause a threat to
the health of college students in which it'll be shown through a primary research study.
Introduction
students can largely be played as victims to the horrid threat of misinformation on Covid-19 due
to college students' substantial presence on social media, which will cause a critical toll on their
health. Furthermore, this issue can be recognized through research that has been conducted on
college students through an experimental survey that allows researchers to analyze the
series of different pieces of evidence can help argue the impotence of this issue through other
evidence that’s provided by different people who have experienced the importance of
misinformation and Covid-19. Throughout this paper, I’ll construct recognition on the impact
Misinformation on Covid-19 among College Students 3
that misinformation on Covid-19 can lead to critical threats to the health of many college
students.
Literature Review
There are different aspects of evidence regarding misinformation and Covid-19 that can
further argue the problem of the spread of misinformation through different social media
platforms and news media on Covid-19. This evidence can be provided beyond students, which
includes health professionals, researchers, and journalisms. In addition, evidence can be provided
through literary analysis within these issues. However, professionals within the health field have
recognized the issue of misinformation on Covid-19 being spread regarding different aspects of
Covid-19 ranging from vaccination, protocols, etc. The Control Disease Center has explicitly
recognized the impact of further spread of misinformation, states “...mitigating the risks
associated with COVID-19 requires sustained public action, so misinformation that promotes
false preventives or cures can hinder necessary behaviors to reduce the spread of the disease...”
(Vraga et Bode, 2021). The misinformation can change the behavior of students' approach to the
disease, such as refusing to wear masks, maintain social distancing, etc. based on the false
information that’s being displayed on their screen which causes the health professionals a harder
time combating that virus. Furthermore, in College Campuses Are COVID-19 Superspreaders it
expresses that the spread of Covid-19 cases among college campuses is resulted from the lack of
ability for society to carry out proper research on the issue of Covid-19, instead of relying on
false information. This can be expressed due to the study that was displayed in the article as
there’s been a rise in cases during the first two weeks of college. This is concerning as college
students are actively interacting with their peers. It’s important they are aware of the threats to
Misinformation on Covid-19 among College Students 4
avoid receiving the disease as well as transmitting them to others, especially those with health
conditions in which they are most likely to experience a critical journey of worrisome with their
health.
Moreover, trusting misinformation can lead students to a harmful endgame since the
health professionals and scientists. This can further damage their mental health beyond Covid-19
to an extent that may affect their academic performance in school. Evidently, Steve Posner’s
article, The Danger of Political Stupidity in College, has reason to expect such negative
students are being overwhelmed by a steady stream of online disinformation, political bullying,
medical quackery, baseless conspiracies, and spiteful cruelty...” (Posner, 2020). Such feelings of
these students potentially harm the lives of college students, given that Covid-19 has been the
center of political tools and misinformation over the course of the past year. Unfortunately, this
could be seen through social media and news reports, in which an article called Impact of
Unreliable Content on Social Media Users during COVID-19 and Stance Detection System has
discussed the issue of misinformation within social media that can affect psychological behavior
when interpreting the issue of information. In addition, it further discusses that such an impact of
perceiving false information as fact would lead to social unrest and problematic outcomes. This
greatly affects the scientist and health professional to perform their tasks if such problems like
misinformation make their job to carry out protocols harder than anticipated. Also, many
professionals have tried to remain objective when handling the Covid-19 pandemic as many
Misinformation on Covid-19 among College Students 5
people have turned the Covid-19 pandemic mistakenly into a political issue when it’s rightfully a
health issue.
Speaking of political issues, many politicians have misled the people's perception
towards Covid-19 in which they contribute to the act of spreading misinformation. In the age of
predominant college students' platforms like Instagram, Twitter, etc. One of the well-known
politicians that spread controversial misleading information is the President of the United States
named Donald Trump whos’ barred from many social media platforms due to his continuous
spread of misinformation and violence. Trump has been barred from the platform during the fall
of 2020 in which has played a significant turning point on misinformation. An article called
Misinformation Dropped Dramatically the Week after Twitter Banned Trump and Some Allies by
Elizabeth Dwoskin and Craig Timberg focuses on the downfall of misinformation on Twitter
since Trump has permanently suspended from many platforms. Since his ban, misinformation
has been reported to be decreasing significantly over a period of time. This shows that Trump has
contradicts the scientists' studies. An article called Twitter Removes Trump Retweet Sharing
False Information on COVID-19 Deaths by Nathan Bomey has recognized problems within
Trump’s twitter tweets, where one's states “...a post retweeted by Trump that had falsely claimed
the existence of a "cure" for Covid-19” (Bomey 2020). If a leader of a country has shared false
information on an issue, it would affect the way people should approach the situation as well as
their behavior among others. In this case, Trump sharing false information about Covid-19,
particularly the “cure” would force a change in the public's approach to handling the disease.
Misinformation on Covid-19 among College Students 6
social media platforms to news media, a collective of health professionals has found ways to
conduct thorough studies on misinformation losing the trust of the people. To be more in-depth,
if people develop a continuous spread of misinformation, then the people will exhibit a lack of
trust with any real information that’s being presented to help combat false information. In a study
focuses on the misinformation being viral that can cause a guaranteed danger towards the
community of public health, especially college students. In addition, we must be obliged to reject
the misinformation that’s spreading among college students that are based on Covid-19 because
such false information shared around college students can reach beyond this discourse
community that can pose a greater danger towards some members of society such elderly, health
risks, etc. That’s why it’s important for us to ensure that we are spreading accurate information,
as well as proofreading the information we believe. Based on an article report called Impact of
COVID-19 Pandemic on College Student Mental Health and Wellness has exhibited further
evidence regarding the health of college students, it shows that the impact of the pandemic plays
a high impact on student’s mental health, without the additional influence of misinformation.
Given that misinformation is part of the ongoing spread of Covid-19, it raises the questions on
the further risk on students' mental health as they are perhaps one of the most active members of
our society.
As we include the focus on the impact misinformation can bring to society, it’s important
the power of rhetoric. Rhetoric is everywhere around through human interaction, in which it can
Misinformation on Covid-19 among College Students 7
tend in situations many people may perhaps be unaware of the literary device. Based on Doug
Downs article's Making sense of human interaction and meaning-making, his well-acquainted
states “rhetoric refers to a set of principles that explain and predict how people make meaning
and interact” (Downs, 2013). Within this literary device, it is divided into three subgroups to
provide specific different types of rhetoric in which the application of motivational rhetoric can
be displayed as the appropriate type of rhetoric based on the situation that's occurring throughout
our society. Motivation rhetoric is a type of rhetoric where a rhetor is displaying a motive to
people through different methods such as human interaction, writing, etc. to help further their
own agenda which can be applied in this situation regarding misinformation of Covid-19 among
college students. This can be effective since the false rhetorics within misinformations are
predominantly through different social media platforms such as Instagram, Tik Tok, etc. in which
Furthermore, college students' lack of abilities to detect any false rhetoric will further
push the rhetoric through different discourse communities in these social media platforms. Since
this is likely to occur, it’s important to acknowledge that rhetors can influence the ways many
people may perceive the situation in which an article by Keith Grant-Davie recognizes the
importance of rhetors by stating “rhetor’s role in defining the situation, yet seems to me that
rhetors are as much as many constituents of their rhetorical situation as their audiences''
(Grant-Davie, 2012). Given this case, Covid-19 is a critical disease that costs many lives in
which the environment that people have lived through the past year regarding quarantine,
masking, etc has demotivated people to continue these protocols. This allowed for rhetors to
Misinformation on Covid-19 among College Students 8
spread misinformation on the condition of Covid-19, which later drove many people to believe in
Methodology
The research study was conducted by myself, by going through an experimental survey to
understand the perspective of college students on their views towards Covid-19 and
College Students: Academic and Socioemotional Implications, that focuses on the psychological
and educational aspect of college students through the Covid-19 pandemic in which they’re
required to do tasks online and series of different surveys. Given the survey method, researchers
have learned that college students exhibit frustration with their experience with online tasks
regarding their academics, as well as experiencing mental health symptoms. Impactfully, this
research has elevated further inspiration for the research on misinformation on Covid-19 among
college students. In the research, a survey with a series of questions was asked to a small sample
of 50 participants to help reflect the viewpoints of the college students population. Also, the
survey will consist of 16 questions. The purpose of the method for research is to ensure an
accurate reflection of the student's perspective on different questions to help maintain integrity
research as well as anonymity to avoid any form of outside influence when performing the
experiment. In each of these questions, participants will encounter questions that resolve
information to being tested for Covid-19. In each of these questions, there is a wide range of
Misinformation on Covid-19 among College Students 9
answer choices to help accurately reflect their belief in each question. However, it’s important to
provide many different forms of questions, so these answers can perhaps correlate to other
questions within the survey that may allow the result of the study to be more clarified.
Result
threat towards college students, in which the result consisted of 50 participants answering 16
questions on the survey. An article called Disrupting the COVID-19 Misinfodemic with Network
misinformation by stating “...amid the COVID-19 global pandemic, a highly troublesome influx
of viral misinformation threatens to exacerbate the crisis through its deleterious effects on public
health outcomes and health behavior decisions…” (Young et al, 2021). This can play a factor
within college students receiving as they are perhaps the most active member of our society, in
which they are more often to experience human interaction in the midst of the pandemic. Given
the result, the perspective of college students has further indicated that misinformation is posing
a threat to them since college students are predominantly social media users in which
Throughout the result, 68% of participants were tested for Covid-19 regarding whether they have
ever received Covid-19. There’s 24% of participants who have not been tested for Covid-19,
This result is regarding whether students are worried about their health with Covid-19, in which
it shows that 54% exhibit agreement with eeriness on their health. It shows that 22% of
participants are neutral, while 22% of participants disagree with being worried about their health
This result discusses whether participants are worried about the health of others such as their
family members, friends, etc. regarding the Covid-19 pandemic. The result, it shows that 100%
of participants agree, which it’s broken down into two different types of agreement. 38% of
participants somewhat agree, while 62% strongly agree with the stance.
This result shows that 18% of the participant’s exhibit agreement that prominent political figures
changed their opinion on Covid-19, while 56% of the participants proved otherwise.
Interestingly, there’s 26% of the participants remained neutral regarding this particular question
in the experiment.
Misinformation on Covid-19 among College Students 12
The result shows that 54% of participants disagree with their judgment on Covid-19 has been
decision while 20% of participants disagree that their judgment on Covid-19 is influenced by
misinformation.
In this result, it shows that 80% of the participants have encountered misinformation on the
Covid-19 pandemic, while 8% of participants disagree with the motion that they’ve encountered
Based on this question, the result shows that 80% of the participants took the time to fact-check
information before making any judgment, in which 8% disagree otherwise. In addition, 12% of
Discussion
Although college students' chances of experiencing death from Covid-19 is less likely to
occur in comparison to different age demographics in our society due to them being
predominantly young, it is still important to recognize that misinformation on Covid-19 can play
a critical threat to their health. Over the course of the research, evidence has been shown through
different perspectives and articles that revolve around the aspect of Covid-19 and
the survey was anonymous so participants are able to answer the survey that accurately reflects
their views. The result has been provided as further evidence to prove that misinformation on
Covid-19 can display harm to college students' health. Unfortunately, health professionals have
advocated disenfranchising the spread of misinformation as it can change the behavior on the
ways people may approach the diseases. It is critical to acknowledge that information on
Misinformation on Covid-19 among College Students 14
Covid-19 can be displayed as less harmful and critical in the misinformation than the actual
Within these misinformations, it consists of false rhetorics in which the rhetoricians use
to change the perception of people’s opinion on Covid-19 to further their agenda in which is to
factor that can combat misinformation, but it’ll provide difficulty as misinformation tends to
overshadow factual information, especially when such misinformation is being shared by the
former President of the United States Donald Trump. The former President plays a role in
misinformation to his many followers in which many of those followers could consist of college
students entrusting their safety based on the former president Trump reports, despite the
Covid-19, has provided valid reasons on the importance of conducting fact-checking on our
sources as it states “In such circumstances, misinformation functions as a meta-risk that interacts
with and complicates public's perceptions of the original risk...” (Krause et al., 2019). Given this
statement, it’s important that we conduct an act of fact-checking because it's an important tool
that can benefit the well-being of many college students that may suppress misinformation.
Overall, Covid-19 is a disease that hurts millions of lives across the globe, in which it is
important to ensure safety for the people around us as the disease continues to spread alongside
misinformation.
Misinformation on Covid-19 among College Students 15
Reference
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Copeland, William E., et al. “Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic on College Student Mental Health
and Wellness.” Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry,
Elsevier, 19 Oct. 2020, www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0890856720319882.
Grant-Davie, Kevin. (2012). Rhetorical Situations And Their Constraints. vol.15, no.2, pp. 264
-279
Downs, Doug. “Rhetoric: Making Sense of Human Interaction and Meaning-Making.” Rheotric,
2013, pp. 458–481.
Dwoskin, Elizabeth, and Craig Timberg. Misinformation Dropped Dramatically the Week after
Twitter Banned Trump and Some Allies,
www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/misinformation-dropped-dramatically-the-week-after-
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Posner, Steve. “The Dangers of Political Stupidity in College.” Medium, Curious, 6 Feb. 2021,
medium.com/curious/the-dangers-of-political-stupidity-in-college-bb0351457e49.
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Wani, Mudasir Ahmad, et al. “Impact of Unreliable Content on Social Media Users during
COVID-19 and Stance Detection System.” MDPI, Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing
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Young, L., Sideman-Mauch, E., Twyman, M., & Wang, L. (2021). Disrupting the COVID-19
MISINFODEMIC with NETWORK interventions: Network solutions for network
problems. Retrieved April 16, 2021, from https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33476229/