It's a regrettable reality that there is never enough time to cover all the interesting scientific stories we come across each month. In the past, we've featured year-end roundups of cool science stories we (almost) missed. This year, we're experimenting with a monthly collection. September's list includes how prebunking can restore public trust in election results; why ghost sharks grow weird forehead teeth; and using neutrinos to make a frickin' laser beam, among other highlights.
Prebunking increases trust in elections
Credit: Superior Electoral Court of Brazil /Public domain
False claims of voter fraud abounded in the wake of the 2020 US general election, when Joe Biden defeated incumbent Donald Trump for the presidency. Trump himself amplified those false claims, culminating in the violent attack on the US Capitol building on January 6, 2021. Two years later, Brazil faced a similar scenario in the wake of its 2022 general election in which voters ousted incumbent President Jair Bolsonaro. Once again, claims of fraud ran rampant as Bolsonaro supporters stormed their country's capital.
How can we combat this kind of disinformation and restore public trust in elections? It might be possible to essentially "vaccinate" people against any viral post-election conspiracies that may emerge with a "prebunking" strategy, according to a paper published in the journal Science Advances.
More than 5,500 participants from the US and Brazil participated in the online studies, which were conducted in the US (by YouGov) before the 2022 midterms, and in Brazil (by Qualtrics) after its 2022 presidential election. For the first two studies, participants were randomly assigned to one of two groups. The first group got the "prebunking" treatment, providing them with factual information on all the election security measures in place to counter false claims about voter fraud.
The second group was given information about how certain Trump or Bolsonaro allies had attested to the legitimacy of the 2020 or 2022 election results—a "credible sources" treatment. It's the fact that such allies affirm the validity of election results, despite it being against their own political interests, that makes them more credible. A third study conducted only with US participants compared prebunking alone versus prebunking with a forewarning message featuring specific conspiracies, focusing on the 2022 midterms and the 2024 US general election.