The Effects of PSAs on Public Health

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The claim that vaccines cause autism has been discredited and found to be false. To test the effectiveness of these PSAs, Nihan and Raifler brought together a group of parents with children under the age of 18. They asked them about their attitudes toward vaccination; they were divided into four groups. The final group read a true story about a 10-month-old child who contracted the measles in a pediatrician's waiting room.

If you try to correct someone who you know is wrong, you run the risk of alarming their brains to a sort-of existential, epistemic threat, and if you do that, when that person expends effortful thinking to escape, that effort can strengthen their beliefs instead of weakening them.

In this episode you'll hear from three experts who explain why trying to correct misinformation can end up causing more harm than good.

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